Preamble

The House met at half-past Two o'clock

PRAYERS

[Mr. SPEAKER in the Chair]

PRIVATE BUSINESS

SOUTH OF SCOTLAND ELECTRICITY ORDER CONFIRMATION

Bill to confirm a Provisional Order under the Private Legislation Procedure (Scotland) Act, 1936, relating to South of Scotland Electricity, presented by Mr. James Stuart; and ordered (under Section 7 of the Act) to be considered Tomorrow, and to be printed. [Bill 170.]

Oral Answers to Questions — TRADE AND COMMERCE

Petrol Distribution and Supply of Accessories

Mr. Wade: asked the President of the Board of Trade whether he will now request the Monopolies Commission to inquire into the subject of exclusive dealing in the distribution of petrol and ancillary agreements restricting the supply of accessories to garages.

The President of the Board of Trade (Mr. Peter Thorneycroft): I have nothing to add to my hon. and learned Friend's reply to the hon. Member for Bradford, South (Mr. George. Craddock) on 24th July.

Mr. Wade: I am, of course, aware of that. I am also aware that the Restrictive Trade Practices Bill reached its final stages in this House yesterday. As these exclusive-dealing agreements will probably not even be registrable under the Restrictive Trade Practices Bill, and in view of the far-reaching consequences of this exclusive dealing policy and the growth of a great many tied garages, will the Minister give an assurance that this important subject will be referred to the

Monopolies Commission? If he is not in a position to say that now, can he state definitely when a decision will be reached on this question?

Mr. Thorneycroft: I will bear these factors in mind.

Livestock (Exports)

Mr. Gibson-Watt: asked the President of the Board of Trade the value of exports from the United Kingdom of pedigree livestock, under the various categories, for 1954 and 1955.

Mr. P. Thorneycroft: Pedigree livestock are not distinguished as such in the Trade Accounts. With permission, I will circulate in the OFFICIAL REPORT figures of exports of livestock classified as "for breeding".

Mr. Gibson-Watt: While thanking my right hon. Friend for that Answer, might I ask if, when he produces those figures, he can also give me some idea as to what percentage of the figures finds its way directly to the coffers of the Treasury as a result of these valuable exports?

Mr. Thorneycroft: I can give the figures in sterling for the particular exports, and can show the comparison between the two years. Perhaps my hon. Friend will look at the figures, and if he wants any more information I will try to let him have it.

Following are the figures:


—
1954
1955


United Kingdom exports
£
£


Animals for breeding




Bulls
557,004
595,224


Cows
290,952
281,387


Calves
12,079
*


Sheep and lambs
44,225


Swine
121,849


* Not separately distinguished in 1955.

Films (Policy)

Lieut.-Colonel Lipton: asked the President of the Board of Trade whether he will now anounce his decision on the future of the British Film Production Fund.

Mr. P. Thorneycroft: I hope to be able to make a statement later this week.

Lieut.-Colonel Lipton: Does that mean that the statement will be made tomorrow, or Thursday?

Motor Vehicle Exports

Mr. Snow: asked the President of the Board of Trade whether he will introduce legislation, in order to encourage motor car exports, whereby a statutory maximum value limitation will be imposed on emoluments in cash, kind and property payable to the directors, managerial staff and their dependants of producing companies, on a scale permitting an increasing limitation proportionate to increased exports.

Mr. P. Thorneycroft: No, Sir.

Mr. Snow: That Answer was not entirely unexpected, but is the President aware that I was trying to help him, as, in his own Board of Trade Journal, he and his Department are complaining that manufacturers are living on the "easy home market"? Is he further aware that it is of no use manufacturers complaining about being put out of competition because of high wages when the workers see what is going on in the B.S.A. Company, and see the "top hat" schemes in the City, whereby directors can retire on a pension of £¾ million at the company's expense?

Mr. Thorneycroft: I am sure that the hon. Gentleman's motives are unexceptionable, but I can imagine few methods which would do less to increase exports, and, indeed, which would cause very considerable confusion throughout all industry, than this one.

Mr. Gresham Cooke: asked the President of the Board of Trade the percentage of exports of cars and commercial vehicles combined expressed as a percentage of production fox the first six months of 1956; and how that percentage compares with the export percentage of British industrial production generally.

Mr. P. Thorneycroft: Exports of cars and commercial vehicles by value were about 40 per cent. of production during the first five months of 1956, the latest period for which these figures are available. Exports of all manufacturing industry—excluding food, drink and tobacco—were a little under 30 per cent. of production in 1955, and the proportion exported

during the first half of 1956 is estimated to be rather higher.

Mr. Gresham Cooke: As the exports of the motor industry are well above the average for British industry generally, would it not be a good idea if the attention of the House, after the Recess, were focused on those industries which are below the average? In particular, may I draw by right hon. Friend's attention to to the hosiery industry, the exports of which are about 13 per cent. of production?

Mr. Speaker: Order. There is nothing about hosiery in this Question.

Mr. Jay: While it might be interesting to have corresponding figures for 1951, may I ask the President if he read the article in the News Chronicle a few days ago, written by a well-known American journalist, which reported that it is difficult even now on the east coast of the United States to buy British motor cars? Has the right hon. Gentleman inquired into that?

Mr. Thorneycroft: I have not actually seen the article referred to.

Seeds (Import Duty)

Mr. Holt: asked the President of the Board of Trade what answer he has given to the request of the National Farmers' Union for an increased import duty of 4d. a pound or 12½ per cent. ad valorem whichever is the greater, upon all seeds for sale; and what steps he has taken to consult all cultivators.

Mr. P. Thorneycroft: No decision has yet been taken on this application, the examination of which is still proceeding. It is open to any interested party to submit their views to the Board of Trade and a notice inviting representations was published on 16th June.

Mr. Holt: Can the President say whether he has had any answer to that notice, and would he bear in mind that only about 5 per cent. of farmers grow these seeds and that about 95 per cent. use them, and that it will be greatly against the interests of all users of seeds if the tariff is increased?

Mr. Thorneycroft: We will bear all these considerations in mind, but I do not want to comment on this matter while it is under discussion and consideration.

New Industry, North-East Suffolk

Mr. Edward Evans: asked the President of the Board of Trade whether he is aware of the need for further industrial expansion in north-east Suffolk and the desire of the local authorities of Lowestoft, Beccles, Bungay, Halesworth and the parish council of Reydon to attract industries to their respective localities; and if he will increase his efforts to attract new industries to this area.

Mr. P. Thorneycroft: I am aware of the need for some new industry in northeast Suffolk and of the desire of a number of local authorities there to attract industries to their localities. The Board will continue to bring these places to the attention of suitable firms.

Mr. Edward Evans: While thanking the right hon. Gentleman for that Answer, I should like to ask whether his Department has ever made a survey of the sites available in the area or has consulted with the local authorities as to what cooperation they can give him.

Mr. Thorneycroft: I have consulted to this extent, that unemployment in Lowestoft has in fact fallen substantially in recent years, and new industries have contributed 2,000 jobs since 1947. I do not say that that means that no more could, or should, be done, but it does show that some progress has been made.

Tariffs (Statutory Orders)

Mr. Bottomley: asked the President of the Board of Trade when Her Majesty's Government propose to implement the changes in the United Kingdom tariff agreed upon at the recent General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade Conference at Geneva.

Mr. P. Thorneycroft: It is our intention to lay the necessary Statutory Orders in October.

Mr. Bottomley: Whilst recognising that it will be necessary to get the decision of the House upon this matter, would it not be wiser, having in mind the recent meeting of O.E.E.C. and the discussion of tariffs, and the discussions with the Australians about Imperial Preference, to have a general discussion on tariffs generally?

Mr. Thorneycroft: The discussions will be upon these particular tariff alterations which I am now referring to. Whether there should be some other debate of a wider character is a matter, no doubt, for discussion between the usual channels.

Waste Paper (Salvage)

Mr. Russell: asked the President of the Board of Trade if he will give an assurance that it remains the policy of the Government to encourage the salvage of as much waste paper as possible.

Mr. P. Thorneycroft: The policy of the Government is to encourage the salvage of as much waste paper as can be collected and used economically.

Mr. Russell: May I ask my right hon. Friend to explain what he means by "collected and used economically", in view of the fact that he is now allowing free imports of wood pulp and paper-making materials from all over the Continent, which have put an end to the incentive to collect in this country?

Mr. Thorneycroft: I mean that there is a limit to the amount of waste paper which can be economically used.

Mr. Bottomley: How can the President say that the Government are giving encouragement? If I can give a personal experience, I would say that, having been told, when at the Board of Trade, to save paper, I have offered paper to the dustman for three weeks in succession, and he has said, "Put it in the dustbin in the ordinary way; there is no demand for paper".

Milk (Half-Pint Bottles)

Mr. Chetwynd: asked the President of the Board of Trade in view of the annoyance and waste caused to single persons who are unable to buy milk in quantities of less than a pint, whether he will introduce legislation to amend Section 7 (1) of the" Sale of Food (Weights and Measures) Act, 1926, with a view to ensuring that a dairyman shall have milk in half-pint bottles available at all reasonable times.

Mr. P. Thorneycroft: No, Sir. This Section permits a trader to sell milk in half pints or multiples thereof. It would be outside the scope of weights and


measures law to require him to keep milk available in any particular quantities,

Mr. Chetwynd: Is the President aware that many single people and old-age pensioners are compelled at present in many areas to purchase a pint of milk when they either cannot afford it or have no facilities for keeping it fresh? Can he suggest any way in which his influence can be brought to bear upon retailers to have half-pints available for these people?

Mr. Thorneycroft: So far as my Department is concerned, all I am saying is that there is no power under the Weights and Measures Act to compel someone to keep milk in particular measures.

Viet-Nam

Mr. G. M. Thomson: asked the President of the Board of Trade what steps he is taking to increase trade between the United Kingdom and the Republic of Viet-Nam.

Mr. P. Thorneycroft: My Department keeps in close touch with trade developments in Viet-Nam and provides a regular service of commercial intelligence. There is a Commercial Secretary in the Embassy in Saigon whose advice and help are available to traders interested in that market. The value of our exports to Viet-Nam in the first six months of this year was double that of the same period in 1955.

Hungary

Mr. G. M. Thomson: asked the President of the Board of Trade what increase in the volume of trade between the United Kingdom and Hungary it is estimated will take place as a result of the conclusion of the present trade agreement.

Mr. P. Thorneycroft: Under the trade agreement recently concluded with Hungary, provision has been made for the issue of import licences for about £3 million worth of Hungarian goods over the next twelve months and for Hungarian purchases of about £4½ million worth of United Kingdom goods in the same period. Some other Hungarian products may also be imported into the United Kingdom under open general licence arrangements.

Birmingham Small Arms Company

Mr. Jay: asked the President of the Board of Trade whether he will hold an inquiry under Section 165 (b) (iii) of the Companies Act, 1948, into the affairs of the Birmingham Small Arms Company.

Mr. P. Thorneycroft: No, Sir.

Mr. Jay: Is the President aware that this Section of the Act permits him to hold an inquiry if information is being withheld from shareholders? Is he further aware that the ex-chairman of the company has publicly stated that the present board is deliberately trying to hide essential information from the shareholders? If these accusations are being made by two sections of the board, is there not a case for the right hon. Gentleman to hold an inquiry?

Mr. Thorneycroft: I have no official information about these matters; but I should have thought that one thing at least was clear, namely, that there is no shortage of information for the shareholders at the present time.

Company Directors (Expenses and Pensions)

Mr. Jay: asked the President of the Board of Trade whether he will introduce legislation to amend the Companies Acts so as to limit the amount of expenses and pension contributions which may be allowed for individual directors.

Mr. P. Thorneycroft: I do not think that amendment of the Companies Act would be an appropriate way of dealing with these matters.

Mr. Jay: Does the President really think it reasonable that amounts as great as £9,000 and £11,000 annually should be paid to individual directors as pension contributions and expenses free of tax, and does he not really think that there ought to be a little more public accountability for these public companies?

Mr. Thorneycroft: There is, of course, accountability to the shareholders.

Soviet Trade Delegation

Mr. Hunter: asked the President of the Board of Trade what progress has been made in the placing of trade orders


by the Soviet trading delegation now in this country; and whether he will make a statement.

Mr. Harold Davies: asked the President of the Board of Trade into what categories he divided the goods and materials that the Soviet trade delegation wished to buy here; and whether he can now make a statement about the progress so far made in negotiating mutual trade.

Mr. P. Thorneycroft: Both Her Majesty's Government and British industry have welcomed Mr. Malyshev's visit to this country. The object of this visit was to find out what United Kingdom industry has to offer in the light of the Soviet purchasing programme submitted last April, and to seek clarification about the coverage of the strategic controls. As to the latter, we have divided the programme into two categories of goods, those subject to control and those free. There is a large area of trade which is free from the controls. As to the former object of the visit, it is too soon to expect orders to have been placed, but I am confident that the visits to factories which we have arranged will be most useful, and I look forward to an increase in trade between our two countries.

Mr. Hunter: Whilst thanking the Minister for his reply, I should like to ask him to pay special attention to this matter. These export orders can be worth hundreds of millions of pounds which are vital to this country. I hope he will see that this opportunity for East-West trade is not lost.

Mr. Thorneycroft: May I assure the hon. Gentleman that I have given constant personal attention to this particular matter?

Mr. Davies: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that the trade delegation appreciated the reception which it received from industrialists in this country? Secondly, is he aware that in the two categories into which he divided the trade, millions of pounds worth of those categories covered things useless to Russia, like toothbrushes and boot brushes—[Laughter.]—and will he, in view of the fact that, while we are offering toothbrushes, Russia is sending us hundreds of thousands of tons of manganese, now break down these silly restrictions and get free channels of trade between East and West?

Mr. Thorneycroft: I can assure the hon. Gentleman that the goods which are available cover a rather wider and more important range than that envisaged by him in his question.

Mr. Woodburn: Is the President aware that there is at least one large Scottish firm which has been negotiating a contract of a very large size for nearly two years, and I understand that it is not the fault of the Scottish firm that a contract has not been placed?

Mr. Thorneycroft: It may not be; but I would only say that I think it is the general experience of British industry that the Russian trade delegations to this country are extremely easy to deal with, and business can be carried on on an ordinary commercial basis over a very wide field.

European Trade and Tariffs

Mr. Holt: asked the President of the Board of Trade, in view of the setting up of the two Organisation for European Economic Co-operation study groups on European trade and tariffs, whether he will set up within his Department complementary study groups to prepare definite proposals for submission to the Organisation for European Economic Cooperation so that Her Majesty's Government may give a lead in the move towards a reduction of tariffs in Europe.

Mr. P. Thorneycroft: All necessary work has been, and will continue to be, undertaken within my Department to enable Her Majesty's Government to participate fully in this branch of activity of the Organisation for European Economic Co-operation.

Mr. Holt: May I ask the President if he can give the House an assurance that positive proposals are being prepared by the Government, and that their policy is not to go to the next meeting with no positive proposals and, as they did at the last one, merely to negative proposals put up by other nations?

Mr. Thorneycroft: All proposals by Her Majesty's Government are positive in character. As my right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer has pointed out, no party is going into this meeting with commitments; this is an inquiry which is to take place. But I am quite certain that we shall make a useful contribution to the discussion.

Malaya

Mr. Sorensen: asked the President of the Board of Trade what reciprocal arrangements have been considered recently in respect of the fostering of trade between this country and the Federation of Malaya.

Mr. P. Thorneycroft: I have nothing to add to the Answer which my right hon. Friend the Minister of State gave to the hon. Member on 24th July.

Mr. Sorensen: Surely the right hon. Gentleman remembers that on that occasion it was suggested that reciprocal arrangements might be unwise until a certain Colonial Territory emerged into self-government. As this Territory is now in that position, does the right hon. Gentleman not feel that at least tentative arrangements might be considered with a view to some firm reciprocal arrangement of this nature?

Mr. Thorneycroft: I am in constant touch with my right hon. Friend the Colonial Secretary on these matters. What really matters is not what is written down in some paper treaty but the general sense and relationship between us and the Federation of Malaya. If that remains on as good a basis as it is now, I foresee substantial trade continuing to flow between our two countries. I am not, however, saying that under no circumstances should any particular trade agreement be reached, and I will bear these matters in mind.

Umbrellas (Imports and Exports)

Mr. Sorensen: asked the President of the Board of Trade to what extent the import of umbrellas into this country has affected our own production and export of these articles during the past three years; and what representations on this matter have been made to him during the last year.

Mr. P. Thorneycroft: Information as to total production of umbrellas in this country is not available and I have no evidence that production or exports have been adversely affected by imports. I have had no representations on this matter during the last year.

Mr. Sorensen: Is the President of the Board of Trade aware that in certain parts of the country, including my own constituency, where umbrellas are made,

complaints have been expressed concerning competition with what are alleged to be much more cheaply produced articles from other parts of the world? In those circumstances, cannot the right hon. Gentleman give more information about repercussions on the trade?

Mr. Thorneycroft: If the hon. Member likes to put down a Question, I shall be quite happy to say what the trend in the imports of umbrellas has been, but I have not had any complaints during the last year.

Mr. Osborne: Will my right hon. Friend remember that imports to this country are exports of other countries, just as our exports are other countries imports?

Apples (Import Quota)

Major Legge-Bourke: asked the President of the Board of Trade why the quota for fresh apples imported from the Organisation for European Economic Co-operation and certain other countries, for the period 1st July to 31st December, 1955, as announced in Notice to Importers No. 733, was exceeded by £44,000 cost, insurance and freight; and if he will make a statement.

Mr. P. Thorneycroft: I have no reason to think that it was.

Major Legge-Bourke: Is my right hon. Friend aware that it is certainly the impression of the growers' organisations in this country that it was so? Will he bear in mind particularly that the two months in which there were the highest imports last year were those which are vital to home growers for the disposal of their crop? In view of the big crops this year, will my right hon. Friend ensure that that does not happen again?

Mr. Thorneycroft: I hope that my Answer will have reassured the growers. I do not think that there was an excess. Some of the figures are difficult to follow owing to delays, to a strike in one period or another, and to other matters of that kind, but I am satisfied that there was really no excess.

Commander Agnew: Before fixing the quotas of imports for the coming winter, will my right hon. Friend take steps to consult the home industry and hear its views before deciding what those quotas shall be?

Mr. Thorneycroft: It has to be remembered that these quotas are imposed for balance of payments reasons.

Former Hungarian and Roumanian Property (Distribution)

Sir K. Joseph: asked the President of the Board of Trade whether he will direct the Administration of Enemy Property Department to delay the distribution of former Hungarian and Roumanian assets, in order to avoid the injustice of irretrievably depriving of their own property those victims of Nazi persecution who have complied with every condition prescribed by the said Department for the release of their own assets, except that they have so far been prevented from crossing the Iron Curtain, but who may, in view of the improving travel facilities from Eastern Europe, fairly soon become able to do so.

Mr. P. Thorneycroft: No, Sir. The Administrators of Hungarian and Roumanian Property have a duty to make distributions to the United Kingdom creditors as soon as they are in a position to do so. With every sympathy, therefore, for these unfortunate victims of Nazi persecution, I cannot agree to prejudice the claims of these creditors by deferring their long-awaited dividends for a further indefinite period.

Sir K. Joseph: While thanking my right hon. Friend for his obvious awareness of the human tragedies behind this situation, may I ask whether he thinks that the creditors, many of whom, although perfectly legitimately, are several stages removed from the original transactions with Hungary and Rou-mania, would not press their claim so hard if they realised that a large part of their hoped-for dividend would come from the total sole assets of these unfortunate people, whose only fault is that they are not now permitted to leave the countries behind the Iron Curtain before a certain date?

Mr. Thorneycroft: This has been a long and troublesome matter. I think it is right that, if possible, a final distribution of dividends should be made. At the same time, we have been able to make arrangements whereby the sum of about £250,000 should be made available from the remaining German assets for the purpose of providing a charitable

source for help in some of the worst cases of hardship of the victims of Nazi persecution.

Timber (Strategic Stocks)

Mr. Baldwin: asked the President of the Board of Trade why it is still necessary for defence purposes to stockpile timber, in view of the fact that timber merchants have considerable supplies of timber in their yards and State forests have a large reserve of mature timber.

Mr. P. Thorneycroft: It is not customary to reveal the strategic purpose or the amount of materials in the stockpile. As my hon. Friend knows, however, our strategic stocks of timber are now being reduced, as foreshadowed in the White Paper on Defence.

Mr. Baldwin: Is my right hon. Friend aware that that is similar to an Answer he gave me on 28th July, when he referred me to the Minister of Defence? I put down a Question to the Minister of Defence and was referred back to the Board of Trade. Does my right hon. Friend think that I should ask the Minister of Supply a Question?

Mr. Thorneycroft: I do not think that my hon. Friend will have much success with any Minister: the question of what is or ought to be in a strategic stock is not a matter for public debate.

Anglo-Australian Discussions

Mr. Hurd: asked the President of the Board of Trade what progress has been made with Australian Ministers in reviewing trade developments of mutual interest, including the operation and cost of the 15-year agreement under which the Commonwealth ships to the United Kingdom a major part of her beef exports and receives a guaranteed price.

Mr. P. Thorneycroft: Our discussions with Australian Ministers, including the separate talks about the operation of the meat agreement, have not yet finished and I am not able to make any statement about them at present.

Mr. Hurd: As the Commonwealth of Australia has proved herself to be one of our best friends in the world, will my right hon. Friend give an assurance that he will do his best to reach a mutually satisfactory arrangement with our Australian friends?

Mr. Thorneycroft: I can certainly give my right hon. Friend that assurance.

Mr. T. Williams: Is it the intention of the Government to continue with the 15-year agreement which has been referred to?

Mr. Thorneycroft: I would rather not make any comment on these arrangements at present.

Mr. Bottomley: Can we have any idea when these talks between the Australian Ministers and the President are likely to be ended? For three years we on this side have raised the question of Australian trade, pointing out that Ministers over there are extremely discontented. Can the right hon. Gentleman say that it is not Her Majesty's Government who are holding up the matter?

Mr. Thorneycroft: Nobody is holding up the matter. When one is dealing with trade matters over a wide area between two very good friends, it is right that they should be given adequate and, if necessary, prolonged consideration in order to arrive at the best arrangements.

Oral Answers to Questions — NATIONAL FINANCE

Statistical Services and Information

Sir R. Boothby: asked the Chancellor of the Exchequer what steps he has taken to improve the statistical services and information at his disposal.

The Chancellor of the Exchequer (Mr. Harold Macmillan): I hope to make a statement on this question tomorrow.

Economic General Staff

Sir R. Boothby: asked the Chancellor of the Exchequer whether he will set up an economic general staff.

Mr. H. Macmillan: I observed in the Budget speech that as one grows older one gets a little shy about these high-sounding nomenclatures. Nevertheless, the general idea is sound enough.

Sir R. Boothby: Does my right hon. Friend consider that it would be a good general idea if Sir Roger Makins had an adequate staff at his disposal, because he cannot do the whole of this business by himself?

Mr. Macmillan: Yes, Sir; we shall, of course, try to make any changes and improvements in the staffing which are required.

Mr. H. Wilson: Does the Chancellor's Answer mean that his reference to this matter in the Budget statement was just one more of those airy generalisations which when examined turns out to mean nothing? Will the right hon. Gentleman also turn his mind to this point: in view of the widespread feeling in the country that the Chancellor of the Exchequer is not taking any real grip on the situation but is busy passing the buck to somebody else, will he recognise that what we need is not an economic general staff, but action by the Chancellor of the Exchequer?

Mr. Macmillan: Those questions are both more in the nature of imputation than questions. All I can say is that I reject both of them.

Cheque Endorsements (Committee's Report)

Mr. Page: asked the Chancellor of the Exchequer whether he has yet received the Report of the Departmental Committee on Cheque Endorsements; and whether he will publish the Report.

Mr. H. Macmillan: I have not yet received the Report but I understand that it is likely to be ready very soon. I cannot at this stage make a statement about publication.

Taxation (Statistics)

Mr. Harold Davies: asked the Chancellor of the Exchequer the taxation per head of population for each of the years from 1938–39 to 1956–57.

Mr. H. Macmillan: As the Answer contains a number of figures, I will, with permission, circulate it in the OFFICIAL REPORT.

Mr. Davies: When hon. Members have the opportunity of seeing those figures, will they find that they show, as a famous Prime Minister once said, that they are "going up and up and up and on and on and on?" Will the right hon. Gentleman, in future, when he is helping the Conservative Central Office to produce "All the Answers "ensure that it gets accurate figures and statistics


rather than the mythical ones when Labour was in power?

Mr. Macmillan: Perhaps the hon. Gentleman will read the figures when they are published.

Mr. Remnant: Do the figures include those showing the reductions in the numbers of those paying tax?

Mr. Macmillan: This is a limited inquiry, but it would be very tedious to read out this very long table. That is the only reason why I am not reading it.

Following is the Answer:
Receipts from Inland Revenue duties, Customs and Excise duties and motor vehicle duties per head of the population in each of the years 1938–39 to 1956–57, are as follows:







£


1938–39
…
…
…
…
19


1939–40
…
…
…
…
21


1940–41
…
…
…
…
28


1941–42
…
…
…
…
41


1942–43
…
…
…
…
51


1943–44
…
…
…
…
60


1944–45
…
…
…
…
64


1945–46
…
…
…
…
65


1946–47
…
…
…
…
61


1947–48
…
…
…
…
66


1948–49
…
…
…
…
73


1949–50
…
…
…
…
73


1950–51
…
…
…
…
74


1951–52
…
…
…
…
83


1952–53
…
…
…
…
84


1953–54
…
…
…
…
82


1954–55
…
…
…
…
88


1955–56
…
…
…
…
91


1956–57
…
…
…
…
96

Potato Imports (Customs Figures)

Mr. Dodds: asked the Chancellor of the Exchequer why the Customs and Excise authorities refuse to make available to the Potato Marketing Board the weekly figures for imports of potatoes.

Mr. H. Macmillan: The Customs figures for imports of potatoes, as of all other goods, are compiled monthly. The Department is therefore unable to supply weekly figures, but I understand that up-to-date information about weekly potato imports is available to the Potato Marketing Board from other sources.

Mr. Dodds: Is the right hon. Gentleman not aware that some weeks ago heavy losses were sustained by the potato trade and the country through lack of up-to-date information? Is he not aware

that the potato trade feels that in such circumstances the Government could do more? If the information is available, will the Chancellor make contact with the potato trade and inform them? If it is not, will he see that it is available next year in order to avoid a repetition.

Mr. Macmillan: As I said in my reply, the information is available to the Potato Marketing Board, but it would need a rather big change in the method of preparing these statistics, which are partly prepared by mechanical methods, to publish them weekly instead of monthly.

Government Expenditure

Mr. Harold Davies: asked the Chancellor of the Exchequer the average Government expenditure per day for each year from 1945 to 1956 with a comparison for the year 1938.

Mr. H. Macmillan: As the Answer contains a number of figures, I will, with permission, circulate it in the OFFICIAL REPORT.

Mr. Davies: Can I have now the last two sets of figures?

Mr. Macmillan: I could read them all out, but it is a very long list. The last are £12·3 million and £12·6 million.

Mr. Davies: Very useful information.

Following is the Answer:
Average expenditure per day by the Government in 1938 and in 1946 to 1955 was as follows:







£ million


1938
…
…
…
…
2·8


1946
…
…
…
…
11·1


1947
…
…
…
…
9·3


1948
…
…
…
…
9·2


1949
…
…
…
…
9·9


1950
…
…
…
…
9·7


1951
…
…
…
…
11·2


1952
…
…
…
…
12·1


1953
…
…
…
…
12·5


1954
…
…
…
…
12·3


1955
…
…
…
…
12·6

I regret that comparable figures for 1945 and for 1956 are not available.

The figures relate to expenditure by the Central Government (excluding the National Insurance Funds) on goods and services, both on current and capital account, and expenditure on grants, subsidies and Debt interest. The expenditure figures are those used in (he National Income Blue Book for 1956, which is to be published in mid-August.

Gold and Dollar Reserves

Mr. Rippon: asked the Chancellor of the Exchequer the total of our gold and dollar reserves on the latest available date.

Mr. H. Macmillan: The gold and dollar reserves stood at $2,385 million on 30th June, 1956.

Mr. Rippon: Does my right hon. Friend agree that the real total reserve may well be about double the figure that he has just given? Is he aware of the discrepancy between the Treasury figures and the estimates of the United States Federal Reserve Board? Is there any way of reconciling the two sets of statistics? In any event, can my right hon. Friend say what he believes to be a satisfactory working reserve in the Exchange Equalisation Account?

Mr. Macmillan: There are many questions contained in my hon. Friend's supplementary question, to which, as, I am sure, he will recognise, I should like to make very careful replies if they were put on the Paper. I will content myself with saying that they are 265 million dollars higher than they were six months ago.

Kariba Project

Major Legge-Bourke: asked the Chancellor of the Exchequer whether, before approving the United Kingdom contribution, he will obtain an assurance that the award of the contract for the building of the Kariba dam granted or to be granted to an Italian consortium would include a penalty clause to provide against incomplete fulfilment together with a bank or State guarantee to assure the carrying out of the terms of such a clause.

Mr. H. Macmillan: The award of contracts for the Kariba project is a matter for the authorities in the Federation, who have naturally satisfied themselves that the contracts contain all necessary safeguards. I understand that there are full safeguards of the kind my hon. and gallant Friend has in mind.

Major Legge-Bourke: While thanking my right hon. Friend for that assurance, may I ask him whether he would agree that this country is making by far the biggest contribution, both by direct contributions and through the guarantee of the World Bank?

Mr. Macmillan: That is the next Question.

Mr. Russell: asked the Chancellor of the Exchequer to state the full extent of the commitment of the United Kingdom in the loan of £28 million made by the World Bank for the building of the Kariba dam.

Mr. H. Macmillan: Service of the loan has been guaranteed by the United Kingdom. We have also agreed to the use of up to £10 million from our sterling subscription to the Bank as part of the loan.

Mr. Russell: In view of this very heavy commitment, would my right hon. Friend not agree that it would have been better to have tried to obtain all the money in the Commonwealth, and to have avoided putting the contract out to international tender?

Mr. Macmillan: That raises, of course, important questions. I would point out that the expenditure in the United Kingdom to be financed by the loan will be at least as much as the amount of the loan, the £10 million. If my hon. Friend has in mind that we ought to consider the question of tied loans, that is quite another matter. On the whole, I think it would be to our advantage to continue with the present system.

Mr. H. Wilson: While we are all disappointed that British firms which tendered for this contract were not more competitive, may I ask the right hon. Gentleman whether he will take time off to explain to his hon. Friend that the course which the hon. Gentleman is pressing on him is just the one that all of us of both parties have criticised so bitterly when it has been applied by the American Government against us?

Mr. Macmillan: Yes, but this is a question where advantages or disadvantages have to be weighed. It is, of course, quite true, as the right hon. Gentleman says, that the Import-Export Bank is operated on a tied basis.

Purchase Tax (Wool Cloth)

Dr. Broughton: asked the Chancellor of the Exchequer what percentage of the annual revenue from Purchase Tax comes from the tax on wool cloth.

Mr. H. Macmillan: Just under ·5 per cent.

Dr. Broughton: While thanking the Chancellor for that information, may I ask him whether he has given further thought to means of overcoming the problem that stands in the way of removing this tax? Will he not consider removing Purchase Tax on clothing, rather than allow this unjust discrimination against wool cloth to remain?

Mr. Macmillan: That is a larger question which, of course, I have under consideration all the time.

Mr. Glenvil Hall: Surely the right hon. Gentleman realises that the yield from this tax is out of all proportion to the damage done to the industry?

Mr. Macmillan: The yield is about £2 million. I have to take that into account in considering the general problems involved.

European Atomic Agency

Mr. Healey: asked the Chancellor of the Exchequer whether the United Kingdom will participate fully in the European Atomic Agency which the Organisation for European Economic Co-operation decided on 18th July to establish.

Mr. H. Macmillan: As the Agency does not yet exist, it is too early to define the extent of the United Kingdom participation, but the United Kingdom will play a full part in the Steering Committee for Nuclear Energy which, under the decision of the Organisation for European Economic Co-operation on 19th July, is to draw up a draft statute for the Agency.

Mr. Healey: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that the Financial Secretary to the Treasury was reported on 18th July as giving a very different impression of what Britain's intentions were in the matter? Is he further aware that this sort of disingenuous dodging of the issue will do nothing to restore his shattered reputation on the Continent of Europe?

Mr. Macmillan: The hon. Gentleman can leave me to take care of my reputation without any assistance from him. At the last meeting of O.E.E.C. not only were the British proposals welcomed by everybody concerned, but a special vote of thanks was carried by all the other countries to us for our work in the Chair.

Banking Organisations (Meeting with Chancellor)

Mr. Osborne: asked the Chancellor of the Exchequer what replies were made to him by the representatives of the banking organisations in response to his appeal for no relaxation of the credit squeeze; whether he is now satisfied that the nationalised industries and the big borrowers are being treated with the same severity as the small borrower; and if he will make a statement.

Mr. Lewis: asked the Chancellor of the Exchequer if he will make a statement on his recent official talks with representatives of the banking interests on the country's economic situation.

Mr. Holt: asked the Chancellor of the Exchequer what additional measures he proposes to take to reduce the present excess liquidity in the financial system.

Mr. H. Macmillan: I would answer these Questions by referring hon. Members to the statement published on 24th July after my meeting with the representatives of the banking organisations. I am circulating a copy of the statement in the OFFICIAL REPORT.

Mr. Osborne: Is my right hon. Friend aware that some of the small traders, while they are prepared to carry their share of the burden of the squeeze, and will willingly do so if it is a cure for inflation, have a feeling that the bigger borrowers and the nationalised industries are not bearing an equal proportion of the burden? Will my right hon. Friend assure them on that one point?

Mr. Macmillan: As my hon. Friend knows, new arrangements for nationalised industries are being made and will come in as the Finance Bill becomes law. They will receive capital from the Exchequer, and they will, therefore, be subject to that degree of control. In general, while, of course, any form of restriction of credit is a burden to those who wish to receive it, I am absolutely convinced that it is in the broad national interest that we should not relax in our efforts to reduce the total amount of credit available.

Mr. H. Wilson: As the communiqué to which the Chancellor referred tells us almost nothing, would the right hon. Gentleman say whether it is a fact or is not, as suggested in the Financial Times


this morning, that he gave a pretty broad hint to the distinguished gathering he called together on that occasion that there would be no further increase in the Bank Rate?

Mr. Macmillan: The communiqué set out what it was thought right to set out as the result of the discussions. I am rather surprised that it should be regarded as something not allowed to a Chancellor of the Exchequer that he should have discussions with bankers. Neither bankers nor Chancellors of the Exchequer are such mysterious people that they cannot have a private talk.

Mr. Wilson: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that we all welcome the fact that he called together that meeting? Is he not aware that he should not feel himself bound by old conventions, such as that his only approach to the City must be through the Bank of England? But if the right hon. Gentleman holds another meeting, will he draw the attention of the Bank of England to the fact that it could help him a great deal more in what he is trying to do if it would operate on the cash basis of the joint stock banks instead of relying purely on the liquidity ratio?

Mr. Macmillan: I receive every possible assistance from the Governor and the other authorities of the Bank, who work in close harmony with the Treasury. I am glad to know that in general my reputation is rising in these matters.

Mr. Holt: Does the right hon. Gentleman not agree that inflation cannot permanently be checked without a considerable reduction in the floating debt? Does he not intend to take additional measures to achieve that in the near future?

Mr. Macmillan: I have put forward certain additional measures, the first of which was the £76 million reduction in expenditure, but they are not always well received by those who urge me to reduce the amount of the floating debt.

Following is the statement:
The Chancellor of the Exchequer, with the Economic Secretary to the Treasury, today met the Governor and Deputy Governor of the Bank of England, the President of the British Bankers' Association, the Chairmen of the eleven London Clearing Bankers, the Chairmen of the Accepting Houses Committee, the Chairman of the Committee of Scottish Bank General Managers, the Chairman of the Northern Ireland Bankers' Association, the Chairman of the British Overseas Banks

Association, and representatives of the Foreign Banks and Affiliated Association and of the American banks in London.
The meeting discussed the economic situation. The Chancellor emphasised that the control of inflation was an essential condition of success in dealing with all other economic problems. It was recognised that effective action could only be taken if the Government and the banking organisations worked in close co-operation. The Chancellor reviewed the measures taken by the Government before, in and since this year's Budget, including measures influencing the supply of money. He indicated that the Government would press on with these measures, the effectiveness of which would increase as the year went on. The Government recognised the valuable part already played by the banking system in maintaining credit restrictions in the face of considerable difficulties. But the Chancellor asked that the contraction of credit should be resolutely pursued and that there should be no relaxation in the present critical attitude towards applications for bank finance. The representatives of the banking organisations took note of the Chancellor's statement and undertook to meet the Chancellor's wishes and the national needs.

Interest Rates (Voluntary Schools)

Mr. Proctor: asked the Chancellor of the Exchequer if he will take special measures to assist the voluntary schools by providing capital at 3½ per cent. instead of the higher rates which have followed as a result of the increased Bank Rate.

Mr. H. Macmillan: I regret that this proposal is not practicable.

Mr. Proctor: Does the Chancellor not realise that the managers of voluntary schools are in a very grave position? Does he not know that in one case brought to my notice the interest rates have gone up from £115 to as much as £200 a week? Does the right hon. Gentleman not realise that he has disrupted their plans, broken their hearts and sacrificed them to the financiers of the country in his dear-money policy?

Mr. Macmillan: I realise that the problems exist, and I regret them, but I do not think that the Government could lend at a lower rate than they have to pay themselves.

Mr. Stokes: In view of the fact that these people are providing a national necessity, is it not possible for the right hon. Gentleman to arrange for them to borrow money on at least as good terms as through the Public Works Loan Board?

Mr. Macmillan: I think that the rate of interest is the same as the long-term rate of interest of the Public Works Loan Board.

Company Directors (Expenses)

Mr. Osborne: asked the Chancellor of the Exchequer if he is satisfied that company directors' expense claims are adequately scrutinised by the Inland Revenue officials before being allowed; and if he will make a statement.

Mr. H. Macmillan: Yes, Sir. As I have previously pointed out, there is frequently a wide difference between the amount of expenses claimed and the amount allowed.

Mr. Osborne: Does my right hon. Friend not think it true that the amount of publicity given to the unpleasant Docker case indicates that it is a most unusual case?

Mr. Macmillan: I am confident that the Revenue carries out its task efficiently. I remember that a year or two ago there was some feeling that it was carried out rather too vigorously. Now sometimes it is thought that the Department may be a little lax. One must remember that there is no publicity given at all to all the cases where claims are disallowed.

Mr. H. Wilson: In view of all the evidence produced from this side of the House, and indeed from all parts of the House, during the debates on the Budget and the Finance Bill, will the Chancellor, instead of sticking to the stalling reply which he gave last Tuesday, say whether he has had time to consider the proposal which we made in April that a percentage, say 50 per cent., of the money paid on directors expenses and other deductible expenses should no longer rank for Income Tax exemption?

Mr. Macmillan: I am satisfied that this part of the law is being carried out by officers of the Revenue.

Tate Gallery

Mr. Hector Hughes: asked the Secretary to the Treasury how many and which pictures with their names and artists now in the custody of or belonging to the Tate Gallery are not on public exhibition; why they are not on public

exhibition; where they are; and how long they have not been on public exhibition and why.

The Financial Secretary to the Treasury (Mr. Henry Brooke): There are over 4,000 pictures at the Tate Gallery, of which about 1,200 are exhibited at present. I regret I cannot supply a complete list of the remaining 2,800 which are either in the reserve collection—where they can be viewed on application—or on loan. I cannot say how long each particular picture has been in the reserve collection, as individual records are not kept.
In replying to the hon. Member on 26th and 30th July I have explained why some pictures are exhibited while others are not.

Mr. Hughes: Does the Minister not really think that this non-disclosure of large numbers of pictures is inconsistent with the purposes of the Tate, and unfair to the artists and to the public? Will he take steps to see that pictures are sent to galleries which can and will exhibit them, such as, for instance, the Lane pictures to the Dublin Art Gallery?

Mr. Brooke: The pictures are freely lent to galleries in this country. The same pictures do not always remain on exhibition. The object is to provide for visitors a varied collection of exhibits, changing from time to time. As to the Lane pictures, the hon. and learned Gentleman will be aware that I answered a Question of his on that matter yesterday.

Sir R. Boothby: Is it not rather odd that no records of these pictures are kept? What happens if one of them goes astray, if there is no record kept?

Mr. Brooke: We keep records of the pictures but I did not think I could very well circulate in HANSARD a list of 2,800 pictures and the names of the artists. What we do not keep is a record of the exact period during which each picture is on exhibition or in store.

Students (Dollars)

Sir C. Taylor: asked the Secretary to the Treasury whether he will allow a small allocation of dollars to students for the purpose of visiting the United States of America and Canada.

The Economic Secretary to the Treasury (Sir Edward Boyle): Dollars are already provided in certain cases to enable students to pursue a course of study in the U.S.A. and Canada. But while there is no basic travel allowance for North America dollars cannot be granted for ordinary visits.

Sir C. Taylor: But now that Russia has said that she will encourage at great expense tourists from this country, would it not be a good thing for ordinary British people to have an opportunity of seeing what goes on in the United States and in Canada?

Sir E. Boyle: The question of a general travel allowance is a different one but, until our balance of payments position is more secure, we cannot afford to take on an additional commitment of this kind.

Mr. Donnelly: May I press the hon. Gentleman about this point? Is he aware that there is a point of no return if we refuse to give opportunities for, say, our engineering or architectural students to visit the United States of America, and that this may well be one of the best ways of investing what few dollars we have, so will he not reconsider this matter?

Sir E. Boyle: I cannot add to what I have said already on this point.

Entertainments Duty (East Coast Festival Dances)

Mr. Osborne: asked the Secretary to the Treasury if he is aware that entertainment tax is now being demanded for the East Coast Festival Dances that have been arranged every year since the war by a private committee of the Cleethorpes Corporation; and, since the festivals were known by the Customs and Excise department for many years before the question of taxation was raised, and in the light of the correspondence sent to him by the hon. Member for Louth, if he will give instructions for this belated claim to be dropped.

Mr. H. Brooke: These dance festivals are liable to Entertainments Duty under the law. But as regards arrears, the Customs is able to modify its claim, and I will write to my hon. Friend.

Oral Answers to Questions — HYDROGEN BOMB TESTS

Mrs. Castle: asked the Prime Minister what reply he has sent to the resolution forwarded to him by the Provincial Assembly of Presbyterian and Unitarian Ministers and Congregations of Lancashire and Cheshire on the dangers of hydrogen bomb tests and the need for international agreement to abolish them.

The Prime Minister (Sir Anthony Eden): I received a printed circular from this body containing a resolution, which I acknowledged.

Mrs. Castle: Does the Prime Minister not think that an expression of anxiety by a serious body like this warrants more careful attention, and more courteous attention? [HON. MEMBERS: "Oh."] Is the Prime Minister aware that this resolution was passed in June and he received it three weeks before the meeting of the Disarmament Commission in New York at which the hydrogen bomb tests were discussed? In view of this plea to the Government to take the initiative to secure international agreement, why was not action taken?

The Prime Minister: I cannot accept that any discourtesy of any kind was shown. Very large numbers of communications are received in Downing Street, with a great many of which I deal myself, but this was a printed circular signed by the reverend gentleman in print. If he wished to draw my personal attention, I do not think that it would have been asking too much of him that he should have signed his name to the document.

Mr. Beswick: Would the Prime Minister answer the last part of the supplementary question in which my hon. Friend the Member for Blackburn (Mrs. Castle) asked why no initiative was taken by Her Majesty's Government's representative at the United Nations discussion on disarmament?

The Prime Minister: I have several times explained our attitude to limitation, and if the hon. Member wishes to raise that matter he should put it on the Order Paper.

Oral Answers to Questions — PRIVATE BILL PROCEDURE (COMMITTEE'S RECOMMENDATIONS)

Mr. Glenvil Hall: asked the Prime Minister what action the Government propose to take on the recommendations of the Joint Committee on Private Bill Procedure.

The Prime Minister: The Report of the Joint Committee on Private Bill Procedure, presided over by the right hon. Gentleman, contains valuable recommendations which have engaged the close attention both of the Government and of the authorities in the two Houses. The right hon. Gentleman the Chairman of Ways and Means has informed me of the progress made on the recommendations which concern him. I am circulating in the OFFICIAL REPORT a statement indicating the action taken on a considerable number of the recommendations. Those not referred to in the statement are still under consideration.
I should like to take this opportunity to express our gratitude to the members of both Houses who served on this Committee.

Mr. Glenvil Hall: Can those parts of the Joint Committee's recommendations which require legislation be included in any legislation which the Government may promote later on the White Paper which is now in the Vote Office?

The Prime Minister: I wonder whether the right hon. Gentleman would let me consider that. What I am circulating in the OFFICIAL REPORT indicates the action which we have already taken on a considerable number of these recommendations. As the right hon. Gentleman knows, there are more than twenty of them. I think that I should like consideration about the legislation point.

Following is the statement:

REPORT OF THE JOINT COMMITTEE ON PRIVATE BILL PROCEDURE (H. C. 139)

Recommendation (2)
The Chairman of Ways and Means has indicated that he prefers the existing procedure, which, though open to some criticism, effectively safeguards the rights both of the individual Member and of the promoters. He has added that he is unwilling to exercise the discretion which the second part of the recommendation seeks to give him. The exercise of a discretion such as that suggested by the

Joint Committee would, in his view, often conflict with the non-political character of the office of Chairman of Ways and Means.

Recommendation (5)
This recommendation has been carried out.

Recommendation (6)
The Chairman of Ways and Means has indicated that the difficulty of obtaining a quorum in Committees on unopposed Bills has been overcome by other methods, and in his opinion no action on this recommendation is necessary.

Recommendation (7)
The Chairman of Ways and Means has given instructions that, from the beginning of next Session, a sufficient record of the decisions taken by Committees on unopposed Bills in this House, and the reasons therefor, should be kept and made available to Members of the Committee who wish to consult it.

Recommendation (8)
The Chairman of Ways and Means takes the view that this recommendation should not be carried out. The double Committee stage proposed by the Joint Committee would add to the expense of the promoters; and the view of the Chairman of Ways and Means is that consistency in private legislation is sufficiently ensured by the fact that the advice of the Speaker's Counsel is by Standing Order made available both to unopposed Bill Committees and to opposed Bill Committees which contain local legislation clauses.

Recommendation (9)
This recommendation was carried out by the amendment by the two Houses of the relevant Standing Orders on 21st February, 1956.

Recommendation (10)
The principle of this recommendation has been accepted. Acting in conjunction with the authorities of the House of Lords, the Chairman of Ways and Means has proposed that the saving which results from re-arranging the printing charges in pursuance of this recommendation should be divided equally between the Stationery Office and the promoters of Private Bills.

Recommendations (11) and (12)
The Chairman of Ways and Means takes the view that these two recommendations should not be carried out.

Recommendation (14)
The Chairman of Ways and Means has indicated that the revision of the fees charged by both Houses has been completed, and it is hoped to give notice of the necessary amendments to the Standing Orders of this House before the summer Adjournment.

Recommendation (15)
This recommendation has been carried out in both Houses; completely revised and modernised lists of Agents' charges have now been agreed to by Mr. Speaker and the Clerk of the Parliaments respectively.

Recommendations (17) and (18)
The Chairman of Ways and Means and the Lord Chairman of Committees have agreed that a review of the Standing Orders should be undertaken by the officers of both Houses.

Recommendation (19)
The Model Clauses Committee, which operates under the direction of the Chairman of Ways and Means and the Lord Chairman of Committees, has decided to carry out this recommendation in future editions of Model Clauses. The Committee has already drawn the attention of all the Parliamentary Agents to the recommendation.

Recommendation (20)
The preparation of the material for this Bill is well advanced. No indication can be given at present as to its introduction.

Oral Answers to Questions — SUEZ CANAL

Mr. Emrys Hughes: asked the Prime Minister what consultations he has had with the Commonwealth Prime Ministers on the question of the Suez Canal.

The Prime Minister: I would refer the hon. Gentleman to the statement I made yesterday.

Mr. Hughes: Is the Prime Minister aware that his statement yesterday has only created confusion? Is he aware that the Manchester Guardian financial correspondent says today that the business world is in confusion as a result of the statement yesterday, and that people trading with Egypt do not know what to do, and that the restrictions are unworkable? Is not this the first proof of the failure of the economic war against Egypt?

The Prime Minister: I do not think that that was the point of the Question, which asked about consulting Commonwealth Governments.

Mr. Bellenger: I do not know whether the Prime Minister is making a statement on this matter today, but is he aware that he gave a specific answer on the point of the destroyers which seemed to indicate that it was within the province of the British Navy? Is the right hon. Gentleman still of that opinion?

The Prime Minister: I have nothing further to say. Perhaps if the right hon. Gentleman wants an answer to that question it can be raised tomorrow, when there will be a discussion.

Oral Answers to Questions — COLONIES (MINISTERS)

Mr. J. Johnson: asked the Prime Minister what consideration he has given to the need for an extra Minister for the Colonies.

The Prime Minister: I have nothing to add to what I said on 16th June, 1955.

Mr. Johnson: Does the Prime Minister not think that the Colonial Office is being overwhelmed today by events—in Singapore, Malaya, Cyprus, Malta, the Seychelles, the Caribbean, the Gold Coast and Nigeria? Is there not a case for a peripatetic Minister—[An HON. MEMBER: "A sympathetic Minister."]—particularly in Africa, to go out and see what is happening, because too often we find that events are taking the Government by surprise? We are faced with these events and the Government do not seem to know what they are doing about them.

The Prime Minister: I know the hon. Gentleman's interest in this question but I really have some doubts whether peripatetic Ministers, even if they are sympathetic, would be particularly the means of dealing with this kind of situation. I think that those on the spot must advise the Colonial Office on this matter, and the staffs of Ministers must be adequate but not more than adequate for the tasks which they have to fulfill.

Mr. P. Williams: Is my right hon. Friend aware that a great number of us are willing to rely on Her Majesty's Government's representatives overseas, and are much more interested in being able to put Questions to Ministers who are responsible for them?

Lieut.-Colonel Lipton: Could we not have an additional Minister in the Colonial Office, whether peripatetic or not, without extra expense if we dispensed with one of the unnecessary Scottish Ministers?

Oral Answers to Questions — HOUSING AND LOCAL GOVERNMENT

Land Ownership

Mr. Gibson: asked the Minister of Housing and Local Government whether he will arrange for a census of land ownership and the types and sizes of estates to be carried out at an early date.

The Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Housing and Local Government (Mr. J. Enoch Powell): No, Sir.

Mr. Gibson: May I ask the Minister if he is aware that there has been no census of land holdings and owners in this country since 1873; and is it not time that in the management of the national estate of this country the nation should know who owns the land, how big are the various plots, and all about it?

Mr. Powell: There is provision for obtaining information about the ownership of land used for agriculture, but it is not clear that the immense labour involved in a complete survey being made and kept up to date would be justified.

Mr. Stokes: May I ask the Minister whether he is aware that about 90 per cent. of the value of the total land of Great Britain is in the towns, which is not agricultural? Why does he shut his eyes to the fact that the landlords of the country have been robbing the people for years and will go on doing so—[HON. MEMBERS: "Hear, hear."] I am glad that the Opposition recognise it—and will go on doing so until he introduces a proper tax on land values?

Mr. Powell: If that be so, it would not be disclosed by a survey of this kind.

Lieut. -Colonel Bromley-Davenport: Sir, was not that last question asked by the right hon. Member for Ipswich (Mr. Stokes) one in particularly bad taste? We all know that the right hon. Gentleman has a lot of potatoes himself.

Mr. Stokes: Mr. Speaker, on a point of explanation, may I tell the hon. and gallant Gentleman the Member for Knutsford (Lieut.-Colonel Bromley-Davenport) that I have no potatoes at all. The Minister in this case is misguided. Is he aware that my interest is to get the land values, which the people have themselves created, returned to them, instead of allowing them continually to be robbed by the land owners?

Rating Valuation (Compounding Allowances)

Mr. Simmons: asked the Minister of Housing and Local Government if he will take steps to secure uniformity in the relationship of the eligibility to compounding allowances to the increased assessments due to rating revaluation.

Mr. Powell: No, Sir. Uniformity among local authorities could only be secured by legislation which abolished their proper discretion in this field.

Mr. Simmons: Is the Minister aware that he told me about three weeks ago that any house which was subject to compounding before revaluation was, by the 1955 Act, still so subject, and that his answer was not correct because the local authorities now tell me that they have the right to fix the compounding limit? My object is to get a regular compounding limit to safeguard people on the revaluation,

Mr. Powell: All compounding is, and always has been, subject to resolution of the local authority, but the 1955 Act enabled local authorities, if they made a resolution, to subject to compounding any house which had previously been so subject.

Slum Clearance

Mr. Ellis Smith: asked the Minister of Housing and Local Government if he will make a statement on the prospects for slum clearance, and the response made to his proposals by local authorities; on what date the City of Stoke-on-Trent will receive confirmation for the Longton and Fenton clearance areas upon which an inquiry was conducted on 29th November, 1955; and if he will see that all such applications for confirmations are in future expedited.

Mr. Powell: During the first half of 1956, 1,184 clearance area resolutions were submitted by local authorities, involving 21,048 houses. The comparable figures for the second half of 1955 were 581 clearance area resolutions, involving 11,558 houses. I consider this response by the local authorities most encouraging.
The inquiry held on 29th November, 1955, related to the Longton No. 40 and 41 Clearance Areas Compulsory Purchase Order, which included two clearance areas in Longton but none in Fenton. The Order was confirmed on 9th February last.
Measures are in hand to expedite the progress of slum clearance orders at all stages, but I do not consider that the time taken to deal with this particular Order was unduly long.

Stoke-on-Trent Development Plan

Mr. Ellis Smith: asked the Minister of Housing and Local Government if he will give the dates on which he received the plan for the city of Stoke-on-Trent; when the public inquiry was held; and when the city will receive sanction to proceed with the carrying out of the plan in accordance with the decisions of the City Council of Stoke-on-Trent.

Mr. Powell: The modifications which my right hon. Friend proposes to make to the plan have been discussed with the City Council, which is now preparing revised maps giving effect to these modifications. As soon as these maps are ready my right hon. Friend will formally approve the plan.
The Answers to the first two parts of the Question are 29th June, 1951, and January, 1952.

Tree Planting (Circular)

Mr. Ellis Smith: asked the Minister of Housing and Local Government if he will give a report on action taken or proposed, as shown by the replies to his circular concerning tree planting, litter prevention and removal, and the general tidying up and beautifying of towns and cities.

Mr. Powell: The circular on tree planting, a copy of which I am sending to the hon. Member, did not ask for replies from local authorities. The circular was issued only five weeks ago; but there is already evidence that it has stimulated a great deal of helpful interest in this subject.

Mr. Ellis Smith: Is the Parliamentary Secretary aware that some public-spirited local authorities are alleging that the credit squeeze is putting them in difficulty in this matter? Will the hon. Gentleman ask his right hon. Friend to consider this, and see if something cannot be done about it?

Mr. Powell: I should be glad if the hon. Gentleman would give me individual particulars.

BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE

Mr. Gaitskell: May I ask the Lord Privy Seal whether he has any statement to make about the business for tomorrow?

The Lord Privy Seal (Mr. R. A. Butler): Yes, Sir. I have a short statement to make. Tomorrow, Wednesday, at the request of the Opposition, the following subjects will be debated on the Third Reading of the Consolidated Fund (Appropriation) Bill:
The situation in the Suez Canal.
The administration of the Seychelles.
The position of Seretse Khama.
As was announced to the House last night, we propose to take, after the business already announced for today, the Motion to set up a Select Committee on Procedure.

Mr. H. Morrison: Does the right hon. Gentleman consider it entirely satisfactory that the most important events in Egypt should have approximately only one-third of tomorrow's sitting? Is not this a matter of such vital importance that we ought to have a whole day's debate? Would it not be better either that the House should sit on Friday, so that we could devote Thursday to the subject or, possibly, that my right hon. Friends might consider postponing until later the debate on the Motion for today, which seems a little out of place in the light of the events last weekend?

Mr. Butler: I am sure that the House will agree that every consideration should be given to the point of view of the right hon. Member for Lewisham, South (Mr. H. Morrison), but we have talked over these matters with the Opposition, and, after discussion through the usual channels, we consider that this is the best way to give ventilation to the subject of the Suez Canal. I think it will enable all that can properly be said at the present time to be said, and that, I think, is a consideration which we all ought to bear in mind in taking a responsible view of the situation.

Sir R. Boothby: Does my right hon. Friend realise that what he has said means that tomorrow's debate on the Suez Canal will, inevitably, be confined


almost entirely to Privy Councillors on both sides of the House, and that it will be quite impossible for back benchers on both sides to have a chance to be heard if we have a debate lasting only two hours on this vital subject? I think that the House is being affronted in this matter.

Mr. Warbey: May I support the plea which has been made by my right hon. Friend the Member for Lewisham, South (Mr. H. Morrison) and the hon. Member for East Aberdeenshire (Sir. R. Boothby)? It is quite clear that back bench Members will have no opportunity whatever of taking part in the debate. Either we have a debate or we do not; and if we are to have a debate, let us have a proper debate, in which everyone has a proper opportunity to participate.

Mr. Paget: Is not this subject exempted business, Mr. Speaker, and cannot the debate on Egypt continue as long as we wish? May we have an assurance that we shall not be switched to some other subject while hon. Members still want to discuss Suez?

Mr. Speaker: Tomorrow's business, if it stands, is exempted business, and anything which can be said on the Consolidated Fund (Appropriation) Bill can be said in the debate, as far as I am concerned. I understand that these arrangements have been made for the convenience of the Opposition, whose day this normally is, and it is for them to choose what subjects they want to debate. I am not aware of anything in the rules of order which would enable me to limit the discussion to any particular subject or any particular time.

Mr. H. Morrison: May I reinforce the point which I have made? The Lord Privy Seal, as I am sure he will accept, is the guardian of the rights of the House. If the programme proceeds as arranged—I agree that it can proceed otherwise; and it is just as well to remember that—it can hardly be more than an exchange of views between the two Front Benches. It is not enough for the two Front Benches to agree about this matter. It is important that the House as a whole should express itself and that the Government should be sustained by the opinions of the House. I suggest to the right hon. Gentleman that nothing less than a full day's

debate on this vitally important subject is good enough.

Mr. Butler: As you yourself said, Mr. Speaker, this is a day on which the business is chosen by the Opposition. As I said in my short statement:
at the request of the Opposition, the following subjects will be debated …
We are simply following normal practice in accepting the request of the Opposition, which we think will meet the situation; and in any case the request comes from the Opposition. From inquiries which I have made, I do not think that all the time will be taken by Privy Councillors, nor do I think that the speeches likely to be made from the Front Benches wilt be so long as to take up the whole time. That is in reply to my hon. Friend the Member for East Aberdeenshire (Sir R. Boothby). At any rate, the position will be considered in the light of the representations by the right hon. Member for Lewisham, South.

Mr. H. Fraser: Is it not clearly for the Leader of the Opposition to reconsider his request? Should there not be a full Government statement before we debate the subject?

Mr. J. Hynd: Is the Minister not aware that there are a number of hon. Members who do not applaud the attitude which has been taken by the Government and still less many of the statements made by their supporters? Is it not, therefore, important that adequate time should be given in the debate for all points of view to be heard, as far as possible, from the back benches? Will the right hon. Gentleman consider that point?

Mr. Butler: It is always the duty of the Administration of the day, especially when dealing with grave matters of national importance such as this, to pay attention to public opinion as expressed in the House, as representing the country. I can assure the hon. Member that we are already aware of the varieties of opinion. We shall be more aware of them after this debate.

Mr. J. Amery: Is my right hon. Friend aware that there is no point in having a debate at all unless full expression is to be given of the different opinions held? Will he join with us in supporting the views of the right hon. Member for


Lewisham, South (Mr. H. Morrison) and asking the Leader of the Opposition to reconsider this matter?

Mr. Harold Davies: May I ask for your guidance, Mr. Speaker? Are there not some means by which back benchers on both sides of the House, no matter what opinion they may hold on this problem, can have the opportunity of debating this subject, if necessary, on a Friday, so that the opinions of back benchers as well as of Privy Councillors can be heard? Is there not some way by which the voice of the House can be heard at this time, instead of only the voices of right hon. Members on the Front Benches?

Mr. Butler: Undoubtedly, the right course to take is always to pay attention to the expression of opinion in the House of Commons. I ought to do so. My duty, as Leader of the House, is to pay attention to the representations which have been made and, in allocating the time to be given to the debate, to give consideration to them and to the position in which you, Mr. Speaker, are placed.

Mr. Gaitskell: May I say that our desire in approaching the Government on this matter was, first, to secure that the subject would be debated before the Summer Recess? It seemed to us that a debate on a Third Reading of the Consolidated Fund (Appropriation) Bill was an appropriate way of dealing with the matter. There is, of course, no time limit to it; it is exempted business. It is certainly not our wish in any way that the debate should be confined to Front Bench speakers. On the contrary, I hope that the Front Bench speeches will be relatively short and that back benchers will have plenty of opportunity to express their views.

Mr. Elliot: Is it not a fact that the subject of the Suez Canal is the first subject for debate on the Third Reading of the Consolidated Fund (Appropriation) Bill, that the House will have an opportunity of debating it at the earliest possible moment, and that there will be no time limit whatever on the subject? [An HON. MEMBER: "That was said two minutes ago."] It does not seem to be clear to all hon. Members in all parts of the House, and I am trying to get the facts

clear. There is nothing whatever to stop a full day's debate on this subject tomorrow, and that means that some of the objections which have been raised do not seem to apply.

Mr. Rankin: If it is the intention to have a full day's debate tomorow on the Suez Canal, why did the Leader of the House bother to mention the other two subjects? Could not the right hon. Gentleman now tell us exactly what the intention is for tomorrow? Are we to have in the House a full-scale debate which is in keeping with the full-scale debate which is going on outside the House?

Mr. Butler: Many subjects are raised on the Consolidated Fund Bill. In fact, any hon. Member can rise in his place and raise any subject he likes. It would have been possible for me, had I had the art of divination, to divine what hon. Members would raise in the debate, but it so happens that these three subjects were mentioned by the Opposition and Suez was deliberately put first as being obviously, at any rate in the opinion of Her Majesty's Government, by far the most important. That was also the view of right hon. Gentlemen opposite.
Therefore, in the light of representations which have been made, it is clear—and this is an answer to the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Lewisham, South (Mr. H. Morrison) and my right hon. Friend the Member for Kelvingrove (Mr. Elliot)—that it will be our duty to see that the debate is sufficiently protracted to give sufficient opportunity for hon. Members to express their opinions.

Mr. H. Morrison: I am sorry to have to intervene again, but is not this an unsatisfactory procedure? Is it desirable that this debate should take place on the Consolidated Fund Bill?

Mr. Stokes: How else can it be done?

Mr. Morrison: There are other means, which I have already indicated.

Mr. Stokes: Not practical.

Mr. Morrison: On the Consolidated Fund Bill it is difficult to divide the time. I gather that there is no possibility of a Motion or Division. I do not say that that is desirable, but it might be. I submit that this method is not paying proper respect to the rights of the whole


of the House of Commons. We should have a separate debate on Egypt, which could easily be arranged by one of the two methods which I have indicated.

Mr. Ellis Smith: To avoid any misunderstanding outside the House, particularly in industrial centres, will the Leader of the House make it clear that we have reached an agreement on our request for a debate about the cruel action of the British Motor Corporation only at the request of the trade union leaders, who are desirous of negotiating a settlement?

Mr. Butler: Yes, Sir. The Opposition have forgone their original request to debate the motor industry in order to give priority to the Suez Canal debate. I should have thought that that was an indication of the importance attached to the debate and the desire of the whole House that the debate should be a real one.

HOUSING SUBSIDIES, SCOTLAND

The Secretary of State for Scotland (Mr. James Stuart): With your permission, Sir, and that of the House, I should like to make a statement on housing subsidies in Scotland.
As the House is aware, a review of the housing subsidies payable in Scotland has been taking place, in consultation with the associations of local authorities and I am now able to announce the changes which the Government propose to make. Relevant facts were assembled by a Working Party of Departmental and local authority officials set up at my first meeting with the associations last April and its report is available in the Vote Office today.
It should be borne in mind that, after May, 1957, local authorities will cease to be liable for owners' rates in respect of their own houses, and that the subsidies of over £9 million a year at present being paid for these contain £1,400,000 a year for owners' rates. As it is not proposed to disturb these earlier subsidies, this amount should be taken into account in assessing the level of the new subsidies.
It has already been announced as the Government's policy that, while no one should be asked to pay more rent than he can afford, subsidies ought not to be given to those who are not in need. Many

tenants are, however, being subsidised at present to a greater extent than is necessary. If the rents of existing houses were raised to a reasonable level, the deficits on the housing accounts of local authorities would disappear and their rate burdens would be reduced. Further, the existing pool of Exchequer subsidies, with a fair contribution from the rates, would provide a substantial margin to help finance the future building programme.
Taking these factors into account, the Government consider that local authorities could carry on building with a reduced subsidy for new houses of £24 per house a year for sixty years. This flat rate subsidy would take the place of the present three-tier subsidy structure for houses of different sizes.
I promised last year that in considering the new subsidies the Government would have regard to special Scottish needs. The Working Party concludes that in Scotland as a whole the need for houses for homeless families and to relieve overcrowding is greater than the need for houses to replace unfit houses. I accept this view and, accordingly, the basic subsidy of £24 will be made available for all approved housing needs.
I come now to some special needs which justify rates of subsidy greater than the basic £24.
The first is for houses required to accommodate overspill. For these houses the proposed rate is £42 a year for sixty years. This, along with a reasonable contribution from the sending authority, and the payment of reasonable rents, should avoid any undue burden on the housing account of the receiving authority. Next, we think it reasonable to pay a special rate where a local authority builds a substantial number of houses to meet the needs of incoming industry. To encourage this it is proposed, in approved cases, that the rate of subsidy should be not £24 but £30 a year.
Thirdly, many local authorities will have to build multi-storey flats, and the Government are prepared to take a fair share of the extra burden. They propose that for these houses the basic subsidy of £24 should be paid, with an additional contribution calculated, in each case, to cover two-thirds of the amount by which the tender costs exceed the tender costs of ordinary houses at the time. This


additional contribution will apply normally to buildings of eight storeys and over, but also, where necessary, to buildings of six and seven storeys.
I propose that the new rates of subsidy should be payable for houses covered by tenders received in my Department after today. Houses in tenders received up to today, which receive approval, will qualify for the present rates of subsidy.
The Government have decided that the existing statutory obligations of local authorities to contribute fixed contributions from the rates should be abolished. This will give the authorities greater freedom than before in considering in what proportions the housing burden should be borne by tenants and by the ratepayers. The new subsidy proposals assume, however, that local authorities will still contribute a fair share from the rates, amounting to about one-third of the Exchequer contributions.
There may be a few authorities who will be able to show that the reduced rates of subsidy will impose an undue financial burden on the rates. In approved cases of this kind, the Scottish Special Housing Association will be authorised, within the limits of their annual programmes, to assist these authorities by building a number of the houses required in their districts. The Association will also be authorised, within the same limits, to build houses to take "overspill".
No change is proposed in the existing arrangements for the payment of additional assistance in respect of houses built by local authorities in remote areas or for the agricultural population. The Government will introduce legislation to provide for these changes as soon as possible. Hon. Members will recollect that I have also indicated my intention of introducing town development legislation. I intend this legislation to be introduced in the same Bill as that to give effect to the revision of subsidies. Discussions with the local authority associations about town development proposals will begin shortly.

Mr. T. Fraser: The Secretary of State will appreciate that he has made a statement of grave importance to Scotland. Does he appreciate, when he talks about the need to increase the rents of existing

houses to make a contribution towards the financing of future programmes, that local authorities will require to increase the rents of existing houses by about 150 per cent. to 200 per cent. before they remove the deficits on such houses?
Will he also bear in mind that recent legislation, which removes the burden of owners' rates from local authorities, has transferred that burden to the tenants, so that tenants have a much heavier burden to carry? Does he appreciate that although he has said that the local authorities might make a contribution of about one-third of the Exchequer contribution, if the Exchequer makes a contribution of only £24 local authorities are likely to have to make a contribution of £50 or £60 a year, even charging a rent increase of £35 or £40 a year? Since the Government's policy is said to be one of stabilising costs and prices, will he tell us what contribution this proposal makes to that policy?
Finally, what were the reactions of local authorities towards the proposals which he has put before us today?

Mr. Stuart: The average general rent contemplated in working out these new proposals is about 15s. a week, which is not unduly high in relation to the present average weekly wage or salary. To carry out this policy we feel that some relief is necessary to the general taxpayer, and that reasonable rents should be paid. It is a question how the burden is divided between those who pay the rent, the ratepayer and the taxpayer, and the 15s. a week to which I have referred is about 7½ per cent. of the average weekly wage payment.
The hon. Member asked how we thought that this would assist in keeping down prices. All I can say in reply is that it is the general policy of the Government that subsidies should not be paid where they are not necessary, and that where people cannot afford to pay the rent special provision must be made.

Mr. Fraser: Will the Secretary of State bear in mind that when tenants are paying 15s. a week in rent they are probably paying another 15s. a week in rates? It is the total paid for housing accommodation which must be taken into account. I should like to know what were the reactions of local authorities to these proposals.

Mr. Stuart: I did not anticipate that local authorities would welcome these proposals. The convention did not accept them; indeed, it felt that higher rates were necessary. The County Councils' Association would have been content with the present rate of subsidy, and the cities, with the exception of Edinburgh, have not commented up to date. I think that that answers that question. As for the additional burden of rates, it is a fact that rent rebate schemes should, and no doubt will, be operated in cases where they are necessary.

Mr. McInnes: Does the right hon. Gentleman realise that these drastic reductions in Scottish housing subsidies, from an average of £42 to £24, with a corresponding reduction in the local rate of contribution, will entail an average increase in rental of £25 to £30 a year for 500,000 municipal tenants in Scotland? Does not that make nonsense of the Government's policy of wage restraint? How can the Secretary of State possibly expect the co-operation of working-class people in the freezing of wage demands when, at the same time, he imposes such a tremendous burden upon the average family budget?

Mr. Stuart: The fact is that wage rates have gone ahead of the rents charged. In

other countries—America, and elsewhere—it will be found that the average contribution to rents from weekly wage earnings is higher than what is contemplated here, which works out at about 7½ per cent. of the average weekly wage.

Mrs. Mann: The right hon. Gentleman mentioned that the new subsidy would be £24, and stated that the local government subsidy would probably be about one-third. Is it his intention to take steps to limit the local contribution to one-third, or may local authorities contribute as much as they like?

Mr. Stuart: Under the new proposals it is a matter entirely for local authorities.

Several Hon. Members: Several Hon. Members rose—

Mr. Speaker: There is to be legislation upon this matter. The debate should go on then, and not now.

BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE

Proceedings on the Motion in the name of Mr. R. A. Butler relating to Procedure exempted, at this day's Sitting, from the provisions of Standing Order No. 1 (Sittings of the House).—[Mr. Heath.]

Orders of the Day — CONSOLIDATED FUND (APPROPRIATION) (NO. 2) BILL

Read a Second time.

Bill committed to a Committee of the whole House.

Committee Tomorrow.

Orders of the Day — DEFENCE AND MANPOWER

3.56 p.m.

Mr. George Brown: I beg to move,
That this House calls upon Her Majesty's Government to prepare forthwith a four-year plan for the ending of National Service, with the last call-up in December, 1958, and for the building up of Regular Armed Forces; to discuss this plan with our Allies at the December meeting of the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation Council and, in the light of that discussion, to take their final decision on its implementation: and, further, calls for a substantial cut in defence expenditure.
I have read all the words of the Motion to the House because, from some of the discussions which have gone on outside—in newspapers, and elsewhere—about our debate today, it seems to me that there is a great tendency to comment without having read exactly what it is that comment is invited upon. One might get the impression either that we were proposing that the Government should act unilaterally, without consulting N.A.T.O., or were calling upon them to end conscription this year. Indeed, all kinds of weird and wonderful things might be imagined from some of the comments made by the newspapers.
In fact, as those who have read the Motion, or have heard me read it, will see, we are asking for none of those things. We are proposing that the Government should embark now, without any further loss of time, upon what is bound to be a long-term operation—an operation which, in our view, is bound to take four years to bring to fruition. Unless it is embarked upon at some stage the ship will never come home at all. Therefore, we think that it should begin at this stage, and without any further loss of time, because so much time has already been lost in facing the essential issues—of which this is only one—of our defence planning.
One of the reasons why we are so anxious that the House should pass a Motion setting out a time-table which should be adhered to and indicating the amount of time involved, rather than the very vague—however excellently worded—Amendment of the Government, is simply that if we stick to the sort of vague proposals which are outlined in the Amendment we shall go on doing what we have been doing up till now, making a lot of statements which mislead many people and incline them to the view that we are going to do something when we are not, and ending up with even more time lost than we have lost already.
Of course, it is open to be argued that what is happening in the Suez Canal area at the moment in some way makes the timing of this debate open to question. If, next week, we are faced—as we might be—with a very ugly international situation, arising out of what has happened in the Suez area, the Government, the House and the country will have to consider our whole position in the light of that situation. We all hope, of course, that it will not come to that. If it does not, the position will not have to be faced, but, if it does, then it will have to be faced, and so we accept it like everybody else.
Since we all hope that it will not come to that, and since there is no reason for declaring at this stage that it will, and since, in any case, it will inevitably be a long-term operation on which we invite the Government to embark, there seems to be every reason for continuing to discuss the merits of this long-term operation. I should have thought that it was open to argument that one of our problems about defence in this country is that we have made too many stops and starts and changes in course, because of changes of wind, and as a result we have never continued on a chosen course long enough to get the benefit from that course. I should have thought that, for all these reasons—and I personally do not accept the argument that there is any reason why we should delay the necessary preliminary discussion of this objective—when dealing with the use of manpower in the forces, our object is to make it more effective and less costly than it is now.
Let me say one other thing by way of preliminary. I do not start, and I do not


invite the House to start, from the view that in changing over from half-conscript and half-Regular forces to wholly Regular forces which would be smaller in total number, we assume that that means that we would then get a weaker defence effort as a result. If I thought that, then, as I said in the debate in February, I would not myself accept it.
Indeed, I think it is very much open to argument that, so long as one can see one's way through the difficulties—and I will be quite frank and mention some of them in a moment—the ultimate result of the operation, once carried out, will be a much more effective, much stronger and keener, as well as possibly less costly, defence service than we have at the present time. That is an additional reason for not assuming that this is something from which we can withdraw the moment the climate is unfriendly outside. If I am right in my conclusion, it is something with which we should push on, rather than withdraw from.
This debate does not start on its own, out of the blue, on the subject of manpower. I do not propose myself to discuss this as a mathematical operation in which we have a lot of sums based on a lot of figures, most of which are conjectural, on which one may make assumptions upon the basis of the sums one has done. It is not that kind of debate or that kind of operation. This debate springs out of and continues the one we had in February this year.
In that two-day debate, my right hon. Friend the Member for Ipswich (Mr. Stokes), who opened it, and many of those who took part in it, made a number of criticisms which were received not at all badly in the House and outside. They were criticisms of the way in which the Government had been carrying on their administration of our defence services. In particular, we criticised the amount of money that was being spent, not of itself, not as being wrong to spend that amount of money necessarily, but for the lack of results it was producing either in the forces, in equipment for the forces, in the mobility of the forces, or in any of the things that really mattered.
We asked in that debate that the Government should take action, not just waffle and dither along, but take action.

Among the things which we asked them to do was to overhaul the defence planning and defence direction here in Whitehall, to take real steps to get an effective defence direction and planning organisation, and to make up their minds on their attitude to the implications of the nuclear weapons that are now coming so much more easily; and I use those words in the sense of meaning just that, because they are much easier to hand, much more easily transportable, and can be used with much smaller deliverers.
We asked them to get down to the possibilities of the kind of Air Force they wanted, and the kind of equipment, in the shape of planes, rockets, and missiles with which they wanted that Air Force to operate. We pointed out that we were very likely to get the appropriate missiles without the appropriate planes to fly them, or, alternatively, we might have the planes without any particular weapon system that should be used with them. Finally, among other things, we asked the Government to make up their minds on the question of National Service.
I do not think it will be unfair to say that the Government reply to that debate was ineffective in the extreme. The Minister of Defence, whose absence we all deplore today—I understand that he is unwell, and we are all sorry about that, because the right hon. and learned Gentleman is one of the most liked men in the House—had to plead that he had had only a few weeks in his office at that time, and, obviously, could not have been expected to know all the answers.
The Secretary of State for Air will forgive me for recalling that, when he wound up the debate, there was virtually a complete collapse, and we had no reply at all. From the point of view of the Government Front Bench, it was a most ineffective answer to a debate which was generally thought to have been, on the whole, useful and of a very high standard.
We are, therefore, entitled to ask the Government today, and this is the point from which we start, what they have done since they failed in that debate to show us any real answer to our criticisms. Virtually six months have gone, and during that period we have been spending about £700 million at the present annual


rate of expenditure. Have we got anything better at the end of it, after having added £700 million to the already largely wasted expenditure of £4,500 million? Have we anything better to show for the additional money and the time that has passed since then? We have only to ask the question for the answer to become obvious.
Have we reorganised the aircraft industry, which, everybody agreed, needed reorganising so urgently? Have we cut down the large number of contractors, each of whom was using too small a labour force? Has the Air Force overcome its aircraft troubles? Has the Air Force got a fighter plane which can use missiles when available? Have we got the rôle of the Royal Navy clear since then? It looks to me to be a little optimistic to say that we have, in the light of some of the statements that have come from the Admiralty. Has the defence organisation been put right? Are we still operating with a Chiefs of Staff Committee and with a chairman who, as chairman, as was said by my right hon. Friend, is, as it were, the chairman of the other club, co-operating against the politicians in charge?
One only has to ask the questions to see that the answers are obvious. No change has taken place at all in any one of the things about which hon. Members in all parts of the House asked the Government to do something rather urgently so that we might have an effective defence system in this country in keeping with the danger of the times in which we live, with the needs of the times, and with the need to render an effective contribution to the alliances with our Allies?
I am quite sure that nothing has been done, and that is where we begin this debate. We shall proceed to concentrate attention on one particular aspect of this matter, but I beg the House to realise that this is one of a number of major defence issues, which the Government have burked, are burking, and, to judge by the Amendment on the Order Paper, show every sign of continuing to burk, so long as they continue to occupy their present position.
We are really in great danger of repeating some of the worst mistakes of the 'thirties. This business of a Defence Minister who looks more and more like a

Minister for the Co-ordination of Defence, such as we had before the war, and less and less like a Defence Minister, ought to worry everybody in this House and outside it, too. This is not a question of the personality of the Minister. It is the nature of his appointment, the nature of his responsibilities and the obvious way in which he simply appears either as a post box or a co-ordinator, whatever that may mean. I regard that as the paramount change which the Government have to make.
Something else has happened during those six months which transcends the dither over these major issues, and for which I think that Ministers are guilty. We have had a succession of waffling speeches in the country in which the speakers held out what I consider were quite unjustifiable hopes of rosy changes—speeches in which we were told that we could have all this and heaven, too, in no time at all. Speeches made by Ministers gave the impression that they were hoping, or intending—and one could read into them which interpretation one pleased—to get rid of National Service at an early date, and there was no reason why people should not assume that that would happen. We have had speeches about making large cuts in the cost of defence, of reducing the level of defence spending, which must have led people to assume that something would happen.
The worst of them all was the speech made by the Chancellor of the Exchequer to the Foreign Press Association. I looked again last night at the hand-out of that speech from his Department. Unless the Minister of Labour and National Service has a concrete announcement to make today, it is fantastic that a four-page document of close type should be issued by the Press Office of Her Majesty's Treasury with the whole, or nearly the whole, of the first two pages entirely concerned with discussing what would happen if we could get our percentage of expenditure on defence down to 5 per cent.; if we saved £700 million beyond what the right hon. Gentleman called spare resources, and then applied that £700 million to other things.
On reading it one assumes that it is to be done and one has to read all through it before one finds, right down near the bottom of the second page:
Of course, these calculations are a pipe-dream. We know we cannot have it.


What is the point, when a Chancellor not only spends his lunch-time saying this but, in days when he is supposed to be looking for economies, turns on the whole Press machine of the Treasury to issue this document, presumably for everybody to print, and then says, "Of course, it is all nonsense. We know we cannot have it and we do not intend to"?
Not only is it silly and, I think, rather cheap, but it is very dangerous. When this is reported and circulated round the country the qualifications and reservations attached to it are not always apparent. People assume that a Chancellor who goes to the trouble of making a lunch-time speech and issuing a handout about saving £700 million is on the verge of doing so, or wishes to try to do so. They get the wrong idea about the possibilities in defence spending and the wrong idea about the political situation.
As the House will know, I do not always agree with what is said by my hon. Friend the Member for Dudley (Mr. Wigg). But I thought that he was absolutely right when he told the Secretary of State for War the other night that one part of the recruiting problem is the confusion caused in the minds of those who would have been the sort of people to recruit by these implications of vast changes.
Ministers, in my opinion, must bear a large measure of the guilt for having approached this matter in an inadequate, impossible and misleading way. They have confused our people at home and frightened our friends abroad. Part of the problem which has arisen in Germany, and the complications there, result not from Motions put down by the Opposition, but from the fact that our friends overseas do not know what the Government may be up to. They are disturbed by what they read about what Ministers are saying.
Instead of doing this kind of thing, the Government should have been giving a sensible and sober lead towards bringing about the much overdue and much needed N.A.T.O. reappraisal. In the last few months we have had so many stories put out about the alleged weakness of N.A.T.O. that we are doing serious harm to an alliance which is of absolute and paramount importance to us and our friends on the Continent. There are aspects of the N.A.T.O. alliance which

are the only bright pieces in the picture at all in the world today.
We have the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation, in which all the Atlantic Powers are involved, and which is of tremendous importance. Instead of gradually and insidiously weakening it, by stories about its weaknesses which are allowed to gain currency while the Government talk about other things—which makes it appear as though the alliance will be weakened still further—the Government ought to have been taking the lead in bringing about the reappraisal of N.A.T.O. which we are told is needed.
We hear a lot about the "trip-wire" strategy. The "trip-wire," apparently, is to lead to massive retaliation. Many people discount that strategy—Sir Richard Gale was talking about it the other day—and say that we have to be prepared to fight in a conventional way, with conventional forces and weapons. All this must be made clear. I do not think that the position may be viewed in terms of black and white, and it may well be that there are confused ideas about the things for which we have to be prepared. But we have to know something about the sort of operations for which we are being prepared, for we cannot prepare 100 per cent. for everything. If we go on trying to do everything we shall end up by doing nothing at all adequately.
If the "trip-wire" strategy is the correct one, how thick is the "tripwire"? How many men are needed on the ground? What fire power is required? Do weapons take the place of men or not? All these things need defining and making clear. It is most important in connection with the position we are discussing today. At present we have a commitment to place certain forces at the disposal of N.A.T.O. Here let me make myself absolutely clear so that I shall not be misrepresented at any stage. None of us on this side of the House is thinking in terms of "welshing" on that commitment at all—

Mr. Charles Ian Orr-Ewing: After 1958?

Mr. Brown: At any stage. If the hon. Member will listen to me, instead of holding up a piece of paper, he will find that the argument is in what I am saying not on paper. At no stage do we envisage


"welshing" on what is very much our commitment on this side of the House. We regard it with pride and importance. Neither before nor after 1958 do we contemplate "welshing" on it.
I admit that the corrollary of what I have said is for me to show that the commitment can be met after 1958 as before. But let us be clear about what is the commitment. It does not mean that a certain number of bodies are committed to the Continent. It is a commitment to place at the disposal of the Supreme Commander four divisions and a tactical Air Force or what, in his judgment, is the equivalent in fighting capacity. We must recognise that conditions change and, of course, military conditions change like all other conditions. We do not live in a static world, and the number of bodies needed to meet that commitment may change.
Changing weapons; changing forms of organisation of the troops in the field; the cutting out of some of the "tail" they carry; less reliance on the dumps behind them—which they may never be able to reach in the conditions of an atomic war—and more on their own resources as they move about—all these things may well make a difference to the number of bodies essential to carry out our commitment in full. Therefore, I say that we have to get the N.A.T.O. reappraisal going so that we can see what is the nature of our commitment in the relevant circumstances of the day, rather than rely on something which, in some circumstances, may be quite irrelevant.
We have only to think back for seven years to realise how much now exists which was then hardly dreamed of, much less thought of as practical possibilities, to realise how irrelevant many of the decisions made then may be in the circumstances of today. I am not putting up a back-door argument for weakening our commitments. I am saying that the present-day nature of the commitments must be decided in the light of present-day circumstances.

Mr. Ian Harvey: I have followed the argument of the right hon. Gentleman with great interest, but I would like to have a point made clear. If there is to be a N.A.T.O. reappraisal, which is very reasonable, would it not be

wiser to wait for it before arriving at a conclusion?

Mr. Brown: I was going to deal with that point shortly but I will deal with it now.
Let us remember that N.A.T.O. is not the "three wise men", but is a collection of fifteen Governments. For fifteen Governments to reappraise their outlook they must have ideas of their own in accordance with which their representatives can discuss and operate. They cannot go there in vacuo. They must have national ideas to pool, out of which to formulate a common policy.
The Motion which we are discussing has been carefully worked out. There is no need for anybody to smile at the word "carefully". Care is something you should always use on defence. We are suggesting that we should try to make up our minds about the right policy with which to make our contribution to N.A.T.O. We can take that policy to the discussion as our contribution to the final decision. If we go there with nothing at all, nothing will come out of the discussion, because everybody will have to go back home and consult his home Government again. A point must be reached where one Government will try to get the others to go with them.
What I am saying about our commitments may not be the only circumstances in which a change will be made. The difficulties in getting a N.A.T.O. reappraisal may be too great and we may have to consider renegotiating our share in our original commitment.

Mr. C. I. Orr-Ewing: I do not disagree with much that the right hon. Gentleman has just said, but it does not seem to follow from his earlier argument, when he said he was uncertain whether the new weapons were coming along. He now says that so great will be the hitting power of the new weapons in four years' time that we can cut down their number.

Mr. Brown: All I am uncertain about is whether the Government are getting those weapons at the rate at which we need them. One of the corollaries of not adopting this policy is that the Government may try to keep 360,000 men immobile and ill-equipped, but we cannot do that for ever. The fact that we


have so many men may lull us into doing it for a time, but once we get down to 200,000 men, or thereabouts, the need that they shall be mobile and air-transportable, and the need for new weapons, becomes inescapable. One of the arguments about starting this operation of doing away with National Service is that it will force a reluctant Government to think of action which they do not want to take under their own steam.
Let me make it clear that nobody in this country has ever accepted the proposition that we have conscription here permanently, but the logical ending of much that is being said today by those who oppose the Motion is that, in some form, conscription is here for ever. If that is the view of the Government, or of any Government, that Government should go and tell the people. Nobody has ever accepted that this is a permanent business, but if it is not permanent then at some stage the operation of getting rid of it and replacing conscription by Regular forces has to be faced.
For many reasons, which I may mention soon, we say that this may well be as good a time as we shall get for starting this operation. For the moment, I am simply saying that it is no use meeting my argument with an argument that really means that we are going on with conscription for ever and shall never be able to get rid of it, unless we are prepared to go to the country and say so.

Mr. George Wigg: I am sure that my right hon. Friend wants to be fair, and I want this to be a good-humoured debate. Let me point out to my right hon. Friend that it is wrong to say that all those who oppose him want National Service for ever. If my right hon. Friend will take the elementary trouble to read the original debate, which took place in 1952, he will find that it was my right hon. Friend the Member for Easington (Mr. Shinwell), my hon. Friend the Member for Newcastle-under-Lyme (Mr. Swingler) and myself who told the House of Commons that certain things were necessary. Nothing was done. It is my right hon. Friend and his hon. Friends, by failing to act for many years and by coming forward now with this preposterous proposition, who are fixing conscription on this country for ever.

Mr. Brown: If my hon. Friend makes that speech too often by way of interruption we shall all be tired of it when it comes in its proper place in the debate. It is a perfectly proper view and one that my hon. Friend holds. It is one from which I have departed only after considerable argument with myself and with others, I have said that my hon. Friend the Member for Dudley is entitled to that view, but he is not entitled to make it repeatedly when he thinks that I am not accepting it. He need not advise me to take the elementary trouble; I have already taken that elementary trouble. It is the more difficult and advanced trouble which I am now taking. By all means let us have a good-humoured debate. I did not say that my hon. Friend wanted conscription for ever, but whether he recognises it or not, conscription virtually permanently is the inescapable logic of the speech that he made here on Monday night of last week. He may not think that, but it is so.
I was very interested in the new partnership between my hon. Friend and the Secretary of State for War. It looked almost as strange as the partnership which existed during the war between two right hon. Gentlemen who were known as "Arsenic and Old Lace". Having listened to the debate and having read it, I now realise that there is no partnership even on that basis. The Secretary of State for War let my hon. Friend down very badly, even though my hon. Friend was going into action on the right hon. Gentleman's behalf. There was a considerable difference between them. I would not say that the logic of what the Secretary of State said in that debate on Monday of last week was that we are to have conscription for ever, but I say that it is the logic of what my hon. friend said, and that had better be faced. My hon. Friend may be right or wrong, but it has to be faced.
There are certain things that everybody accepts about National Service, and I will state some of them now, so that the assumptions I am making are known. One is that the operation of National Service is extremely wasteful of men. I do not think that anyone will deny it. The right hon. Gentleman has several times said so himself. The number of men in the forces, the Army in particular, is staggeringly larger than the number


we had before the war, even including the Indian Army, remembering that we have now a much reduced commitment, and that we have Allies here who were not here in those days.
However we look at it, it is very difficult to get the picture clear. I hope that the Secretary of State, at some stage and as a digression, will consider being a little less secretive about the situation in the Army and the disposition of our forces. After all, an enemy agent or agent of a foreign Power, if he is worth his salt, can find out the facts, because they are on the ground. The only people who cannot find out without tremendous trouble are ourselves. It is time we got the kind of information which was available before the war.
I have had this matter looked into by people who know and who can assess these matters. I find that, even taking into account nuclear development, the fact that we have the United States here in N.A.T.O., as we used not to have, and that we have fewer overseas commitments as the result of political changes since the war, we have a staggering number of men in the Army compared with what we had then. I think that must be evidence of the fact that it is by its very nature extremely wasteful of men.
Secondly, I think that everybody accepts—although I do not think that people give adequate attention to this in their arguments when they are doing their sums—that it is by itself, perhaps, the most complete deterrent to Regular recruiting. The Secretary of State for War said in the House earlier this year:
After having thought a good deal about all the various reasons why we cannot get more and longer Regular recruitment, it is my conviction that the biggest single deterrent to Regular recruitment and retention in the Services is National Service itself."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 1st March, 1956; Vol. 549, c. 1388.]
Nothing could be firmer or clearer than that. But then the Secretary of State seems to run away from doing anything about that fact. However, I think that we all accept that that is so. It is wasteful. I myself feel, too, that the existence of National Service is a great inhibitor of progress in defence thinking. The very fact that a large number of Service men are in this country or elsewhere cushions us against doing the thinking that we would have to do if we had not got such a large manpower cushion behind us.
National Service is probably the only real source of economy in money that we have open to us. We are talking much too loosely about the possibilities of money economy in defence. Whatever we do, whether we keep National Service or whether we do not, the bill for weapons and for mobility is bound to rise, as the Minister of Supply could tell his colleagues if they were in the slightest doubt.
It is no use talking as though this is a sensible defence arrangement as an alternative to National Service. It is not. There is no point in having men under arms at all if we cannot get them to the places where they are needed, and we cannot get them about in this modern world, in view of the trouble that we are having about overseas bases, without costly air transport. It is no use talking about men unless they have relevant weapons when they go into action. Irrelevant weapons are of no use. The bill for them is bound to rise.

Commander J. W. Maitland: Commander J. W. Maitland (Horncastle) rose—

Mr. Brown: Should I not be allowed to get on with my speech? I know what the hon. and gallant Gentleman wants to ask me.

Commander Maitland: What is the meaning of the last part of the Motion?

Mr. Brown: If the hon. and gallant Gentleman will listen to the arguments as they build up as a whole, and then see if there are any gaps at the end, he will save a lot of time. The point of the last part of the Motion is that we ask the Government to put forward their specific plans for cutting costs in money. [HON. MEMBERS: "Substantial."] We ask the Government to put forward specific proposals to obtain a substantial cut in expenditure. I hope that hon. Members will not try to trip me up at this stage.
I have just said that National Service is probably the only real source of real economy open to us in the absence of any substantial change in the world situation. Of course, if we had a controlled measure of disarmament it would alter all that. But the Government are in this jam. If the Government reject the abolition of National Service on the


ground that it is impracticable, or for any other reason, where else are they going to make the economies that the Chancellor and other hon. Members opposite have been talking about?
What I am trying to say is that we are assuming opportunities of money economies elsewhere in the defence effort that may well not be there, whereas this is one that is there if we are prepared to take it and do what is required to get it. It is the Government who are in difficulties about these cuts in expenditure—not us. We are prepared to face up to this situation and take the necessary steps to make the saving. We have no doubt in our minds that National Service ought at this stage to go.
I am being absolutely fair. There are, of course, other possibilities of economy which do not lie wholly in our hands. If our constant pressure for more effective pooling arrangements between us and our other Allies in N.A.T.O. were successful, a good deal of wasteful expenditure could be saved there. Equally, if the Government would take the decision about which of the new weapons they are not going to make and which of the conventional weapons they are going to discard, there would be opportunities for saving there. But the first does not lie wholly in our hands, and so far the Government are flatly refusing to do anything about the second, namely, about deciding to cut out certain weapons, either conventional or non-conventional. Subject to that, the real form of money saving which is immediately available to us seems to me to be National Service, and we should be prepared to take that opportunity.
My approach to this problem is that since we want a less expensive defence system and at the same time a more efficient one than we now have, we have got to accept the fact that we must make these manpower economies by getting rid of National Service. I say this frankly to my hon. Friend the Member for Dudley so that he understands where I stand. To some extent, I am proceeding from the view that we ought to get rid of National Service now for a whole variety of reasons. In other words, I do not do the sums first and then make my decision in the light wholly of the sums. Equally, I am not entitled to ignore the sums altogether. But I think this is a

matter of policy. It is a matter of political decision. I start from the decision that, having looked at all these other methods, getting rid of National Service would be the right thing to do, and then we should look into the sums and see how the matter works out.
Clearly we do not need 350,000 to 400,000 men in the Army in present military circumstances. I do not mean the political circumstances; I mean in view of the military possibilities. Certainly we shall not want the number of men that National Service would make available to us after 1961 when we get the effect of the bulge in the form of the number of men available for call up. We certainly would not want that.
In my view, postponement of the call-up cannot go on for ever. We cannot go on trying to met this situation by simply pushing back the call-up. I think the present postponement is bad. It creates more uncertainty than is good. Whether I am right or not, certainly if we did this for another year it would be a very serious thing indeed. We should have people hanging around much too long.
The only other alternative for dealing with this problem of having too many men available is to have a form of selective service. I see that the newspapers which a month ago were so confidently forecasting that the Government would abolish conscription are now forecasting that the Government are going to adopt selective service in its place. In my view, selective service—that is, compelling some people to do all the National Service—is worse than anything else that we could have. A Regular voluntary force, although consisting of a few people, at least consists of people who have volunteered. To compel one man to do two years or perhaps three years in the Forces while others are outside doing nothing at all is bound to create resentment, complications and disunity among people—all sorts of problems which will destroy the whole arrangement.
The great point of a citizen Army, of universal National Service, was that there was universality and that, therefore, most of us were playing a part. Gradually we have weakened that principle of universality, but the fact that we have weakened it is not a good argument for continuing to do so. It might be a good


argument to stop doing it. I think we have gone too far in breaking the universality for the conscription arrangements to stay. I think that is another reason why they have become unfair and unacceptable in the sense that they worked when virtually we had everyone available.
I beg right hon. and hon. Members to realise that not only shall we have these political complications, upsets and unrest, but we should not think that this can be a way in which the unskilled men in industry can be made to bear the burden. Selective service would have to be selective in the sense of selecting skills as well as selecting technicians. We would not save graduates that way nor technologists that way because many of them are the fellows whom the Forces would want. This might work the other way round and take out more skilled and technically trained people from civilian life.
I reject that proposal on the ground that it is unacceptable politically, unacceptable on the human basis, because I think it would work extremely badly and, finally, I think it is a coward's way out. At best, it is a way of avoiding taking an open decision to make conscription permanent. By bringing in selective service, we would narrow the point at which the burden is borne and, because one narrows that point, one thinks that politically one can get away with that without having to explain it as one would have to if it were made permanent. It is a back-door method of doing something which I think should not be done.
In our view, a firm decision to rely on Regular voluntary forces only is the right course, is the inevitable course to follow, and it had better be followed now than at any other time. The difficulties of carrying out the operation will not get less by waiting. They will not be any less if we wait another ten years before doing it. The difficulties of doing it will always be there at the moment of doing it. It seems to us in some ways that this might be the best time to do it.

Mr. Ian Harvey: When the Chinese are invading Burma?

Mr. Brown: I suggest that the hon. Member is not doing himself justice in talking about the Chinese invasion of Burma. We have little information about

what has happened there yet. Unless what the Prime Minister said is to be falsified in a very few days, that is very unlikely. I think that generally speaking we must advance on the basis the Prime Minister put forward in this House the other day as his general reading of the political situation in the world. It would be an absolutely regrettable "stumer" if he had to explain that speech away because the world had gone sour within three or four days. Generally it is accepted that the tension is rather less at the moment than it was either when we put on conscription after the war or at any of the intervening times. It may be easier to face the decision now than at any other time. Certainly with the emergence of new weapons and decisions that have to be made about them this is inevitably a moment of change, a moment when changes have to be made. If we can dovetail it in with a moment when we are making other changes it would be a more acceptable and attractive time to do it than any other time.
That, in my general view, is the case for getting rid of National Service. What are the objections to it? So far as I can see, only one has been put forward—that we cannot get enough volunteers to cover our needs and commitments when we do it. That was the argument of the Secretary of State for War the other night.

The Secretary of State for War (Mr. Antony Head): It might help if I cleared this up now. What I was saying was that if we were left with the period between 1961 and 1965 we would have too few, but I did not at all exclude the possibility after a few years had elapsed.

Mr. Brown: The right hon. Gentleman said:
The 1961 figure will, I hope, be considerably exceeded by the end of 1965. That is so speculative, relating to a time ten years ahead, that I shall not give a figure; but I hope and believe that it will be considerably in excess of the 1961 figure.
I would welcome it if the right hon. Gentleman would give an indication—he certainly did not give an indication—that in his view there would be enough in the Army, voluntarily, by 1965 to be able to do without conscription then. If hon. Members want to take that line, may I suggest that it would be fairer if today they gave us their idea of what the timetable can be? We have given our idea and if we are wrong about it and the


time-table is being questioned, why do not the Government state their time-table and the number of years they want to take over the job and how they would do it?
So many people are figuring about National Service and the size of the Army that one gets absolutely dizzy. People use different figures which suit them. Everyone has to make certain assumptions and certain guesses, and the final figure becomes different according to the assumptions and guesses made. The right hon. Gentleman said the other night that, in his view, by 1961, assuming we finished the call-up in April, 1958—which is not the proposal we make, as we propose finishing the call-up at the end of 1958 and there would be a couple more registrations in between, which would not make a lot of difference but a little difference to the calculation—we would have in the Army in 1961 a total of between 120,000 and 130,000. The words used by the right hon. Gentleman were:
a total in the Army in 1961 of between 120,000 and 130,000."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 23rd July, 1956; Vol. 557, c. 174.]
I do not think he meant to use the words "total in the Army". If we refer back to what he said earlier we see that he was talking not about the total in the Army but the total of male other ranks in the Army. Therefore, we have to add to the 130,000 10 per cent. to allow for officers and also to allow for women and boys, many of whom do jobs which, if they were not there, would be done by soldiers. Therefore, starting from a date earlier than the one we suggest, we get a figure of about 150,000, perhaps even plus, by April, 1961. That is without having done anything either to pep up recruiting between now and then, to deal with objections to prolongation and recruiting in forms of accommodation, amenities, feeding standards in the Army and the general atmosphere in the Army which make it unattractive to many people and without doing any of the constructive things. We are left with 150,000, or thereabouts, in April, 1961.
I do not accept that figure, because if we were to do the operation, obviously it would not simply be a negative procedure. It would be constructive also, and we would start putting money into the raising of amenities and raising standards to increase the attractiveness of the job, which is something which we have

to do whenever we end National Service. Of course, some part of the saving in getting rid of conscription will have to go to paying for the Regular Army, That would cost not by any means the whole of that amount, but it would take a part of it. We would be doing both operations. Therefore, I say that the figures given by the Secretary of State are the most pessimistic we can get and that the out-turn would be much more optimistic than that.
So far as I can see, no one seriously disagrees that we would require something like 200,000 men as our Army to do the job, if it were a fully Regular Army, which the Army of nearly 400,000 is being asked to do at the moment. I have done this sum in all the various ways I can, and the answer comes out about the same whichever way I do it. The 200,000 is the most pessimistic figure we can get because it assumes no cuts in manpower arising from the changes which I have mentioned. It assumes that we shall continue to have 80,000 or 90,000 men in Germany, whereas we may well find that we can get equivalent fighting power with fewer men. It assumes the maintenance, spread all over the world, of little pockets of troops. Heaven knows what they are all doing. There are 11,000 in Hong Kong and 18,000 in Cyprus, and, of course, 14,000 in Malaya. Some of them have to be there but I doubt very much whether all these pockets of men can be justified militarily.
We reach the 200,000 on the assumption that no reductions are made in the light of the new strategy, new tactics and new weapons. At the same time, we reach the figure of 150,000 on the assumption that we make no improvement in recruiting. In other words, it seems to me that we have nearly the two most pessimistic figures that we can get in order to create that gap of 50,000 which the right hon. Gentleman said would make him say that he could not face the abolition of conscription by 1961.
I think that some economies in the deployment of our forces might well prove possible, just as some improvement in the rate of recruiting would certainly be possible. I therefore conclude that while there would certainly be a risk in any decision to end National Service at any time, we can afford to face it. The only person who can argue about this is the person who will say that he will never


accept the abolition of National Service. Anybody who pays lip-service to the abolition of National Service must accept that at any time of its abolition there will be a period of calculated risk, a trough which will ensue from the time National Service is abolished until we have built up strength again, having got rid of the deterrent which exists in National Service.
The question is this: will this calculated risk be so great in 1961 that we cannot do the job that we suggest in out Motion? In my view, if we make up our mind to do the job, the degree of calculated risk need not be so large that we must refuse to take it. If we make up our minds to do the job and assess the amount of risk we are taking as realistically as we can, and then prepare to raise pay if necessary and certainly to raise the standard of amenities, we can reduce the risk.
There are many things to be done if we make up our minds to do the job. There is the question of housing and of career prospects. My view is that if we make up our minds to do the job, the risk which we have to take is one which we can afford to take. If we are prepared, for example, to order a fleet of Britannias and large freighters to make the Army much more mobile and much better equipped, I think it would be even more possible for us to face whatever risk is involved. In fact, even during the period of risk, it would be a much more effective Army, in some ways, than that which we have at present.

Mr. Cyril Osborne: Mr. Cyril Osborne (Louth) rose—

Mr. Brown: I cannot give way. I have spoken for much too long. The hon. Member can make his point later. It is quite likely that I am wrong about this and it is up to the hon. Member to prove that I am wrong, but for the moment I am assuming that I am right.
The answer to outbreaks of brush fires in the world cannot be a mass of immobile men taking in each other's washing in this country—which is what must be happening to a large extent now, on the basis of the present figures of 267,000 men in this country. We know that we have not the transport for their use. It is very difficult to see what they are doing, except for training each other and the new recruits, apart from taking in each other's

washing. That cannot be an effective answer to outbreaks of brush fires. The answer to a major war, a global war, if it ever occurred—which heaven forbid—cannot possibly be 267,000 immobile men in this country. We should never get them out of the country to take part in it. The answer must be a highly mobile, highly equipped, crackerjack, small Regular Army; and the sooner we try to get it the better.
Our proposal, therefore, is that the Government should now state that it is their intention to work out a plan to end National Service over a period of four years. Let them say that they are not in favour of keeping conscription for ever; that it has to go; that when it goes it will be a four-year operation, or more—and let them say so, if they think it will take more than four years, since that is one of the matters we can discuss; that they propose to bring out a plan now based on, in our view, four years, arranging for the gradual run-down and for ending the call-up after two years. This plan would provide for the gradual rundown so that by the end of four years we should have completed the operation and got rid of the National Service half—or rather less than half—of the Army.
Let the Government produce this plan. I suggest that they should incorporate in it the various means by which they will run down the Forces. In our view, a cut in the period of National Service is one of the methods which might be considered, but there are others. Having produced the plan, let them put it to N.A.T.O., as in our view they are bound to do, in order to obtain a re-appraisal and to build up the habit of effective consultation among allies in the N.A.T.O. organisation. Let them consult N.A.T.O. about all its implications for them and for us—for our contribution and for their arrangements. Let the Government, in the light of that discussion and consultation, make their final decision as to the date of the operation and its implementation.
Meanwhile, let the Government set about the positive side of the operation—the reorganisation of the Forces and the defence system behind them. Let them get the equipment, the weapons and the transport which such forces would need and raise the standards of service to make it more attractive.
I ask the House not to be bulldozed by simple dates. There is nothing sacrosanct about a particular month. Dates of operation can be discussed. There is room in our Motion for that. I ask them not to be misled about N.A.T.O. Our Motion and our plan are quite clear about that. I ask the House to reject the Government's invitation to go on being vague and woolly and uncertain and to say that since this has to come at some stage, the Government should now desert its normal liking for vague and unspecific commitments and should enter into a commitment to produce the plan and to put it to our Allies in order that we can get rid of this wasteful service and replace it with a much more effective and perhaps less costly small Regular force.

Mr. Ian Harvey: On a point of order. The right hon. Gentleman made a statement of facts which is of great interest. He said that there are 267,000 men in this country doing each other's washing—

Mr. Deputy-Speaker (Sir Rhys Hopkin Morris): That is not a point of order. Mr. Iain Macleod.

5.0 p.m.

The Minister of Labour and National Service (Mr. Iain Macleod): I beg to move to leave out from "House" to the end of the Question and to add instead thereof:
affirms its support for Her Majesty's Government in their declared aim of seeking in concert with their Allies a reduction in the demands made by the defence services on the manpower and material resources of the country so far as is consistent with both the safety of these islands, the Commonwealth and the Colonial and dependent territories, and the effective discharge of their international commitments.
The right hon. Gentleman the Member for Belper (Mr. G. Brown) has made a very long and important and, if I may say so, attractive speech to the House. I am bound to say that I think it has two great weaknesses in it, and I do not believe that his essential argument stands up to close examination.
I should perhaps begin with an apology, because, as the House knows, the Government's case was to have been presented by my hon. and learned Friend the Minister of Defence, who is away because of illness, which we all hope will be of very short duration.
I think that the exchanges on Thursday between the Prime Minister and the Leader of the Opposition—and, indeed, the words of the Motion—clearly show that much of this debate is intended, as the right hon. Gentleman indicated, to be devoted to the question of manpower, leaving the wider debate, including weapons, until later on in the Session. I think, however, that it is right that we should try to put this matter in a rather wider setting, because only if we do so can we put these manpower problems into perspective. I believe that it is worth while, particularly at the present time, to look rather closely at what common ground there is—and there is more than might appear at first sight—between the Motion and the Amendment. I shall find it necessary to be critical of the Motion on the Order Paper, but I hope not in any captious sense.
We start with this. It is common ground between the House—and it was made clear on both sides in the foreign affairs debate, and notably by the Prime Minister and the Foreign Secretary—that the possession of the thermo-nuclear weapon makes global war less likely in the years immediately ahead of us. That is the first point. Secondly, there is a growing necessity to preserve our political and our economic position. I think that it would follow from that, and that we would all accept it, that there has to be a reappraisal, which, although it must be realistic, need not be an agonising one, and that the economy in defence which we seek—and again this would be common ground—must be consistent with not "dropping our guard," to use the Prime Minister's phrase.
The defence White Paper stresses, and I am certain rightly, that with the precarious economy that we have we just cannot afford to over-insure, and it follows, therefore, that we must be ready to take certain risks. We have to balance the demands of defence against the claims of industry. Let us remember that the size of the forces affects directly the numbers that we can employ in industry. So our attitude is enshrined in the Amendment. We want to see the demands of defence on our resources reduced, but if, and only if, that is consistent with our own safety and with the discharge of our duty, both to our country and to our friends.
Secondly, the major point surely on which there is a good deal of common ground is the importance of consultation with our Allies, which is implied in the Opposition Motion. In this country we have special responsibilities for defence all over the world, and it is that which makes unreal many of the comparisons which are made with the National Service demands of other countries and which they are able to make upon their nationals. As a general proposition, what is vital to this country is vital also for the free world. It follows that we cannot plan, indeed we dare not plan, alone. We must plan with our Commonwealth, with the United States and with our other Allies, particularly, as the Motion indicates, with N.A.T.O.
I think that what the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Belper said about N.A.T.O. was of great importance and was very welcome indeed. It was good to hear him stress the paramount importance of that Alliance. N.A.T.O. is only a little more than seven years old, and in that short time it has gone forward from what at first looked like just a brave experiment to become an established institution and pillar of our foreign policy. If today the world is at peace, I believe that is largely due to N.A.T.O. The conclusion surely is part of the common ground between us, that we must cling to that alliance and make it vital and strong. My first major criticism of the Motion which we are invited to accept is that it does not follow out the logic of that conclusion. Surely, if that is so, then consultations with our N.A.T.O. Allies have to precede and not to follow disclosures of our own thinking. It seems to me that that is a cardinal point in this matter.

Mr. F. J. Bellenger: Mr. F. J. Bellenger (Bassetlaw) rose—

Mr. Macleod: May I be allowed to finish this point? I want to ask the right hon. Gentleman who is to wind up for the Opposition a question on the Motion. It seems to put first a manpower plan which is based on an arbitrary assumption and to leave our commitments later to follow and fit into that pattern. I believe that the right way is as set out in the Amendment before the House, and that is to examine with our Allies the double problem of our national and international

defence commitments, together with the demands which they make upon our resources.

Mr. Bellenger: Are we to take it that the Government consulted our Allies when they decided to reduce the numbers called into the Services by staggering the call-up age?

Mr. Macleod: Obviously sovereignty remains with a country in all its particular decisions. But the important and very real difference between the Motion and the Amendment is that if it is agreed that on this sort of matter there should be consultation, we believe that it should precede and not follow a major decision of this particular nature.
I confess that I am a little happier since the right hon. Gentleman spoke about precisely what this part of the Motion means, but I should like to put a question directly to the right hon. Gentleman who, I believe, is to wind up for the Opposition. This Motion has in part its origin in a decision, very properly of course, of the Parliamentary Labour Party, and it was quite remarkable, as the right hon. Gentleman said, what differing views were put the next day upon the decisions that were taken. I will briefly quote some of them. The Daily Telegraph said:
Mr. Gaitskell, the party leader, emphasised that cuts should be made only in agreement with Allies.
The Daily Herald said:
… It was made clear that this would be consultation and not, necessarily, agreement. Britain would have to make her own decision.
The News Chronicle said:
All this should be done in consultation with N.A.T.O.
The Daily Worker said:
It was made plain by Mr. George Brown, … that these demands were conditional on their acceptance by N.A.T.O.—so that if the Americans object, the demands drop.
I am sure that one of these at least is quite inaccurate. It is really rather important—and hon. Members opposite must remember that we on this side were not at that party meeting, nor were the Press—that four different newspapers with utterly different points of view should put completely different interpretations on what was said.
I should like to ask the right hon. Gentleman if he envisages that these


matters or decisions, if that phrase is preferred, are taken to N.A.T.O. in December for information or for true consultation because, as I have emphasised, it is our view—and there is some considerable confusion of thought at least in the Press on this matter—that we must have full and close consultation with our Allies on this wide range of problems, and I should like to be assured that the same point of view is taken by the Opposition.
Before I deal specifically with manpower problems, perhaps I can follow the right hon. Gentleman in making one or two observations about the broader problems of economy in defence expenditure.

Mr. R. T. Paget: As I understand it, our commitment to N.A.T.O. is four divisions and a tactical air force. Any consultations which we have with N.A.T.O. would surely be upon that subject; and the provision of that force, as my right hon. Friend has pointed out, does not preclude what we propose.

Mr. Macleod: Yes. As I said, I am more content with that since I heard the right hon. Gentleman's explanation of it, but I think it is important to know whether it is in the Opposition's mind that this decision—let us call it that for the moment—which is enshrined in the Motion is a firm decision with which the Opposition intends to go ahead whatever representations may be made about it, or indeed, whatever the realities of recruitment may turn out to be.
The main deterrent, of course, and our contribution to it, is as important to our Allies as it is to ourselves, and in everybody's thinking it still comes first among our priorities. It follows then that this is not a field in which the pruning knife can be casually or impetuously wielded. Nor can we do without conventional weapons. I have always thought that the term "conventional" is an absurd one. The one certain thing is that weapons are never conventional. They change all the time. In the last few years battleships have gone out of date, antiaircraft and coastal artillery have been virtually abolished, and the Army division reorganised.

Mr. Denis Healey: The Minister of Labour has quite properly

asked my right hon. Friend to say whether the Labour Party Motion implies agreement through consultation, but may I put the same question to him? Does the Government Amendment imply that the Government will accept any decision reached inside the N.A.T.O. Council as the basis of its own policy?

Mr. Macleod: No, indeed, it does not. I said earlier that sovereignty in these matters remains. The point I make on this Motion is a valid one. Is it a flat decision of the Labour Party that, if it, has the power, it will do this, whatever the future position may turn out to be?
The Motion calls
… for a substantial cut in defence expenditure.
I am bound to say that this was the only part of the right hon. Gentleman's speech that I found most confusing. I hope that tomorrow he will read the actual tail to this Amendment and see if, in fact, his words bear out the interpretation he put upon them.
The position is, of course, that in this present financial year we expect to spend a little over £1,500 million—£1,512 million to be exact—towards which we hope to receive about £50 million in American aid. The rearmament programme on which we embarked at the time of the Korean war, although it has run its term, is still producing its fruits in the number of weapons, which is rapidly increasing.

Mr. Emrys Hughes: In economic depression.

Mr. Macleod: It is wholly wrong, and the right hon. Member for Belper put this point clearly enough, to suppose that if we left the present forces where they were, with an unchanged programme, we should hold expenditure at £1,512 million. We should not. Expenditure would, of course, increase, because in all the economies we have to think about we have to remember that we are starting from a rising curve of expenditure and not a flat level.
It is important, secondly, to remember that one simply cannot get drastic changes rapidly in defence expenditure, because the Armed Forces all over the world are a very complex industrial and social organisation, and there is an


enormous momentum which simply cannot be redirected suddenly without most serious dislocation. It follows, surely, from that that a very large proportion of next year's expenditure is, in fact, committed this year. One just cannot close down a base or a depot or even cancel very large production orders or disband a unit and expect to get large savings at once.
I do not want to go into the detail of this proposal. I see that the right hon. and learned Member for Montgomery (Mr. C. Davies), the Leader of the Liberal Party, is with us. We have had a rather remarkable bid from him—I believe that it was £500 million—by way of reduction. I am sure, Mr. Deputy-Speaker, that the House will very much hope that the right hon. and learned Gentleman will catch your eye and explain how this conjuring trick is to be performed.
The bulk of the speech of the right hon. Member for Belper was on the subject of National Service, and here I must try to put, if I may, though rather quickly, a somewhat close argument to the House.
The two figures on which consideration of National Service depends are perfectly easy to define but very difficult to estimate. The first point is the size of the forces that we need to do the things that have to be done; the second is the size of the forces that can be obtained by voluntary recruitment alone. Those are the two key figures. If those two figures are within measurable distance, if the gap is at all small, then any Government would do everything they possibly could to arrange matters so that National Service came to an end. But if, as is my belief—and as, I believe, can be shown—those figures are a long way apart, it seems to me that one is, however reluctantly, driven to an acceptance of National Service, at least for the immediate years ahead.
Whatever we say about National Service, I know that we all feel that the National Service men have been, and are doing, here and abroad, a vital and important job in our Armed Forces. At the same time, I accept what the right hon. Gentleman said about the influence that National Service has on Regular units. I believe that that is important. If there is a rapid turnover of men in the units there is an enormous training problem, and if there is a flow of men constantly

going through—if there is always a pull to "Civvy Street"—it is very difficult indeed to get that pride in the unit which is at the back of discipline, and discipline, in its turn, in my view, is at the back of efficiency. I do not think that we would dissent from the difficulties that National Service causes. Those are the inevitable results of a large body of men in the Services serving for only two years. I merely add that those difficulties would be accelerated if the two-year period was reduced.
What about these figures that I have mentioned? First of all, there is the requirement. That has to be determined by the strategic assessment of the tasks to be performed all over the world. Of course, it is always true that we should try to find ways of doing the same job with fewer men or, at any rate, with fewer men in uniform. We should do everything we can, no doubt, to see if we can get increased—this is a hideous word but it is fashionable now—civilianisation on the part of our forces. I believe that publicity and ridicule are very important weapons in the fight to avoid waste of manpower and man-time in the Services.
Particularly, we must do everything we can to ensure greater mobility because, of course, at any one given time a great number of people are, in effect, out of the real field of use in the Services. I do not think, however, that any of these things—nor do I think that any hon. Member would so argue—affect the main argument. We must pursue those objectives as vigorously as possible, but they, in themselves, will not make the difference between National Service and no National Service.
Perhaps I may now give a few figures. The right hon. Gentleman rather ignored arithmetic which, no doubt, is the right thing to do if it happens to be particularly inconvenient, as it is in this case to the right hon. Gentleman's case. We know that it was announced last October that the Government are planning for a progressive run-down to 700,000 all ranks, by March, 1958. That figure includes officers and women and boys. The comparable figure for male other ranks is about 600,000, and that is the figure I propose to talk about during my short argument on the figures.

Mr. Bellenger: Does that include colonial forces?

Mr. Macleod: I am speaking only about British troops. The present figure is about 660,000, and the run-down on which we have embarked is well up to schedule. We now have the figures for the first effective quarter of the response to the very large pay increases, amounting to about £67 million, which the Government introduced a short time ago.

Mr. John Strachey: Would the right hon. Gentleman explain to us, because we genuinely do not know the answer, why he takes the figure only in terms of male other ranks, except for the reason that it does, of course, suit his case very well to do so?

Mr. Macleod: I do not think it suits my case at all. As regards recruitment, to which I am coming later, it would suit my case better to include officers, because officers have, in the end, to come from the same pool of young men reaching the age of 18.
There is another, and very genuine, point, which the hon. Member for Dudley (Mr. Wigg) has dinned into the House over and over again, that it is not only the men that matter, but also the number of years the men serve, the length of time one may hold them, the effective man-years they give to the country's service in the Regular forces. The right hon. Gentleman the Member for Belper talked about a figure of 200,000 men, and we have, I think, the authority of a recent Adjournment debate for that being the sort of figure—and I am sure it is—which has been in the minds of those in the Opposition who have been making various calculations on this matter.

Mr. Bellenger: That is the figure my right hon. Friend the Member for Belper (Mr. G. Brown) gave as the level likely to be reached.

Mr. Macleod: It is rather interesting, and I will give what I think may be the result of recruitment in a moment. I am not opposing his figure in any way; I am only taking it as my starting point. Indeed, as the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Bassetlaw (Mr. Bellenger) knows, the strength of the Regular Army has been about the same for a long time; it has remained constant at that figure not for a year or two, but since about 1860, except for a few years

at the turn of the century. That is the sort of figure of Regular recruitment there has been.
I do not think we should speak solely of the Army in this matter, because we have got to get our men for all the Services. If we talk in rough terms of 200,000 male other ranks for the Army, that will mean about a total of 450,000 for the whole of the Services, and that itself, if it is possible, is a very dramatic reduction on the figure of 600,000 which I gave to the House a moment ago. It follows, therefore, that if we assume an average of ten years' service—and I believe this to be generous—we must find about 45,000 men a year to meet this particular commitment.
The next thing to do, quite clearly, is to see how big is the pool from which those men must be drawn. At present, rather more than 310,000 young men reach 18 each year. If we assume the same medical standards, and they certainly will not be lower for the Regular forces than they are for National Service, which means, in effect, excluding Grade III, 26 per cent. of that number will be unfit. That leaves 220,000, and that figure includes men in the coal mines, men in the Merchant Navy, all apprentices and students, for whom I have made no allowances at all, In effect, what this proposal then means is that, out of that pool of 220,000 men, we have to find about 45,000 men.
Does any hon. Member in the House really believe that it is realistic to assume that 20 per cent. of the young men coming up to the age of 18 today, in times of full employment, will elect for Regular service in the forces on a 10-year engagement, without a background of National Service? I believe that to be a wholly impractical thought. Nor is it any good looking to pre-war experience; we have an utterly different employment situation, and utterly different demands from the Services, particularly from the R.A.F. which made a very small demand indeed in the years before the war. One can bring these figures into the realm of possibility only by assuming that the three-year engagement is a true Regular engagement. But it is not. It is, as has been shown over and over again in this House, an extension of a National Service engagement, and the vast majority of those men we shall lose.
We have now the evidence of these three months. Of course, one is bound to get a surge upwards when pay is increased, and it is possible that the effect will be short-lived. It may be, on the other hand, that one has got a more permanent effect and will be able to prophesy fairly closely what the final level of recruitment may be. But I am certain of this, that it is quite useless to make a calculation until at least we have seen another quarter's recruiting figures.
There is a special reason for that. The April/June figures, which are the only ones we have seen, and which I do not think the Opposition had even seen when their proposal came out, because they were issued a few days later, are figures for a period of sluggish recruiting. It is the next period, the July/September quarter, which is one of the best periods of the year, which matters, and which will be the best test of whether this sort of operation is at all feasible.

Mr. Wigg: Surely the right hon. Gentleman is not quite right in his last statement. By far the best quarter is the first quarter of the year. The quarter he is coming on to now will not differ very much, I think, from the quarter which has passed.

Mr. Macleod: That is quite true, but the July-September quarter, so I am told, gives a much better figure, or, at any rate, a better figure, leaving out the word "much", if necessary, than the quarter through which we have passed.
The figures seem to show that there has been a reasonable improvement both in outside recruitment and in prolongation. Compared with the same quarter of last year, recruitment was up by about 18 per cent., although the R.A.F. dropped rather below that figure. Both in the Army and in the R.A.F. there was a higher proportion of men who signed on straight away for more than three years.
The hon. Member for Dudley has, I know, been inquiring recently whether the Government are yet ready to revise the figures—and this is a most important point—which we put before the House in the Statement on Defence, paragraphs 53 and 54. The answer is that we are not ready to revise those estimates, but we are reasonably confident that they will not go up; we think it likely that they will go down, particularly in the R.A.F.

That adds force to the case which the hon. Gentleman has been presenting to the House.

Mr. R. R. Stokes: Pure assumption.

Mr. Macleod: No, it is more than assumption now. The men are coming in the whole time. Prolongations of service as well have, on the whole, gone reasonably well in the quarter, although one has again got to remember that if a man is going to prolong, it pays him to do so as soon as he possibly can, because, of course, he at once gets the benefit of the new, higher scale. The most important conclusion, I think, is that although these figures show improvements on last year, whereas the years before have shown a steady decline, they do not, in the view of the Government, provide sufficiently firm ground on which to contemplate the abolition of National Service.
I am not prepared at this stage, with the meagre information which is all that is available after three months, to tie myself—I recognise that this is the key figure which is left in the calculations I have been making—to a figure at which Regular recruitment may level out. It may be—I put it no higher—a figure of about 32,000 men a year, which is the best estimate we can make at present, for other ranks for all Services, or perhaps a total Regular force of 320,000. That will be only when the shake-out is complete, and it will take some time.
If that figure is right, there is a gap between it and the calculations of the Opposition of 130,000, which would be-quire an intake of 65,000 men a year for two years' National Service. That is as good an estimate as I can give to the House of the gap that we believe exists. If we could not meet our commitments with a figure of 450,000—and nobody has suggested a substantially lower figure—we would need to call up more men than the 65,000.
Therefore, making every possible allowance for the advantages of all-Regular forces, which I admit, and the better use of manpower, I cannot see how the number of Regulars could be within measurable distance of the total number that is required.

Mr. George Chetwynd: The Minister thinks that we want 45,000 men and that we shall get 32,000.


Has he ruled out completely any changes in weapons or in commitments to make up for the difference of 13,000 or is it not the case that he is now making an argument that National Service is here for ever?

Mr. Macleod: No, I am not. I will come specifically to the hon. Member's question. It is, I recognise, of great importance.
The figure of 450,000 is not mine. I am not saying that we can do our commitments with that. I am saying that that figure is the natural conclusion with a Regular Army of about 200,000 and that even on that figure there seems to be a gap of 130,000. If we cannot meet our commitments with 450,000 men, clearly we would have to call up more National Service men.
In short, I simply do not believe that the Motion is a practical proposition. It is for the Opposition to justify it. It is an Opposition Motion, put forward in Opposition time. I saw a weekend speech from the hon. Member for Newcastle-under-Lyme (Mr. Swingler), on these lines and, I believe, an article in the New Statesman and Nation by the hon. Member for Huddersfield, East (Mr. J. P. W. Mallalieu), saying the same thing. The Opposition must tell us either that they believe, in the face of the evidence that we can produce, that they could get these recruits, or which commitments they are prepared to abandon so that that gap would be closed. I do not believe that the Opposition can responsibly put forward this attitude unless they are prepared to do one or the other; and I see that some hon. Members at least on the opposite benches would accept that.
To come to the point made by the hon. Member for Stockton-on-Tees (Mr. Chetwynd), I am not for one moment arguing the case that National Service must stay for all time, nor that it must make even the same demands on manpower as in the past. As I see it, the practical problem which confronts us is that if the calculations we have made are right, we will need to supplement the number of Regulars that we are likely to obtain but not to the extent of calling up all the men who become available from an age class.
It is worth while, therefore, to discuss the various ways in which such a limitation of the numbers to be called up each year might be achieved. There have been a number of suggestions in the Press and it is, of course, true that the Government have been considering this very closely indeed.

Mr. Stokes: Before the right hon. Gentleman deals with that aspect, will he deal with the important point raised by my right hon. Friend, who pointed out that there were 136,000 troops abroad and about 264,000 in this country? We are constantly told that there are no forces here. What are the 264,000 doing?

Mr. Macleod: I will leave the details of what the troops are doing to my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for War, when replying to the debate.
In discussing these methods of service, I want to make a few comments about each of the main possibilities. As far as I know, we have never fully debated these issues and the Government would very much welcome, in this debate, the views of hon. Members on them. The present plan, I think, commands public acceptance on the whole, because it takes account of the individual circumstances of the man and fairness between man and man, the needs of the Armed Forces and, in so far as we can take them into account, the needs of the civilian economy.
Our position at present is that we are calling up only three-quarters of any age class and we are allowing the age of call-up to rise. That is a policy that cannot go on for ever, but under it every fit young man, except about 10 per cent. mostly in coal mining and the Merchant Navy, is ultimately called up.
The only alternative way to maintain universal liability is a cut in the period of service, which was the policy some little time ago that the Opposition were urging upon the House. The reasons why the Government have not adopted that suggestion have been debated more than once and I do not intend to go into them again: The arguments for and against are well enough known. The problem, therefore, becomes one of choosing which young men should do their National Service and which should be exempted.
First, we could contemplate the indefinite deferment of men as long as


they were employed in certain industries or occupations, which would have to be defined, on the grounds that those occupations were essential to the national need. The difficulty in this connection, of course, is the difficulty of definition. Secondly, we might extend indefinitely the deferment of those who are equipping themselves by a training course to render skilled service to industry and to the community.
Another system, which has been discussed a good deal in the Press, is a system of allocation and of quotas, rather similar perhaps to the American method, for different regions or counties, the decision about which young men should be called up being left to individual boards in the areas. There is, however, an obvious difficulty of differentiating between individual men without being able to justify it by any clearly established principle that could be represented to the country.
A possible line of approach might be the personal circumstances of the young men; that is to say, the medical or educational standards required could be raised. Whatever scheme has to be adopted, if one must be, we would have to consider whether cases of serious hardship might themselves justify, not simply postponement, but indefinite postponement of call-up. Although there may well be room to move, as I believe it would be right to move, in what I may loosely call the social field, we must not delude ourselves that that would make any enormous difference to the numbers.
Then, there is the method of the ballot, which is a method of selection the advantages and disadvantages of which are known to everybody and are obvious. For that reason, I need not comment upon it. It could be done in various forms but, generally, the idea would be to give a cross-section of the young men to the Services.
The view of the Government, and their very strong hope, is that the day will come when National Service can be ended, but they cannot see that day at present in the light of the known' facts about recruitment and the commitments that we have to face as a country. It seems to follow from that that National Service has got to continue, although we have good reason to believe that we may be able to reassess the respective needs of

industry and of the forces. I think that in those circumstances it is right that our minds should turn not to the direction of abolishing National Service, but towards consideration of the schemes that I outlined to the House a moment or so ago.
The right hon. Gentleman opened his speech by making a reference to the timing of this debate, and saying that he did not accept the view, put forward by some newspapers, that it was an unhappy time to have a debate like this. The position is surely this. We have before us a Motion which has been moved by the Opposition and an Amendment to it which has been moved by the Government. We can, of course, at the end of the day decide the matter in the Division Lobbies, and I dare say that both sides of the House will be here in strength to do so; but I am sure it would be a relief to many Members on both sides of the House if we could have the argument now but not try to take a decision by a vote on this matter tonight.
When we come back in the autumn we shall have a good deal more information before us. We shall know the recruiting figures for the quarter to which I have referred. The right hon. Gentleman said that if the Opposition did not launch this ship—or words to that effect—it would never come home. On the other hand, if the Opposition are really determined to go to sea in this craft they may as well make sure that it is not a sieve in which they are putting out to sea. All the same, whatever decision is taken by the Opposition at the end of this discussion, whether we should or should not vote on this matter, I must give advice to the House on the proposition we have before us.
To sum up, I believe that this Motion starts from the wrong point, and that it ought to start by considering our commitments as they are, and, indeed, as they may be, before it starts making assumptions about manpower. Secondly, I believe still that it is vague in its reference to consultation with our Allies, although, as I have acknowledged, I am more content now after hearing the right hon. Gentleman's explanation of that part of the Motion. Thirdly, I believe that it flies in the face of the known facts about recruitment. I should be very interested indeed to see the case that I have tried to make today, and the case put by the hon. Member for Dudley in a recent


Adjournment debate, demolished by the other side of the House, but the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Belper got nowhere near demolition of that case, and seemed to me to have no basis of fact for the Motion he was putting forward.
For all these reasons, I cannot recommend this Motion to the House. Although I am sure that we shall have an interesting and good-tempered debate, I hope that at the end of it the Amendment which I have moved will be accepted by the House without dissent.

5.44 p.m.

Mr. E. Shinwell: It is, of course, a pity that we should be debating this matter in the climate of Egyptian intransigeance. We are, in a fashion, debating what may be regarded as an abstract issue, one not of extreme urgency, and in the discussion many hypotheses are bound to emerge; whereas tomorrow, as already announced, we are to have a debate on a matter which is immediate and realistic in its nature.
Clearly, whether we like it or not, the events of the past two or three days are bound to colour the views of hon. Members. They may make some impact on their minds and the opinions that they are likely to express. We, the Opposition, are not responsible for what has occurred in the last few days. That will be debated tomorrow, and if any blame is to be imputed it will be laid at the appropriate door.
I am bound to say, having listened to the speech of the Minister, that he seemed to me to be arguing, perhaps with some reluctance, and with certain inhibitions, that National Service, considering the facts available and the figures presented, was likely to be a permanent institution in this country. He did, of course, suggest that there was some common ground between the Government and the Opposition. The fact remains that the Opposition Motion is specific in character; it makes a specific demand—whether rightly or wrongly is, for the moment, beside the point: whereas the Government Amendment—I am sorry that the right hon. Gentleman may not care to agree—is as nebulous and as ambiguous as it can possibly be. Therefore, there can be no common ground between us on that issue.
The right hon. Gentleman urged upon us that there should be a reappraisal—he added, not an agonising reappraisal—of the N.A.T.O. position and, presumably, the defence organisation. Really, was not that going a bit too far, since the Government have been in office for five years? Surely, during that period, opportunities presented themselves for a reappraisal of the defence position. Indeed, to some extent there was a reappraisal embodied in three or it may be four White Papers, presented to the House preparatory to our defence debates. Hon. Members will recall references to the emergence of nuclear weapons, of broken-back warfare, of the new look, of a changed strategy; and all the while, if the right hon. Gentleman's statement is correct, that we now require a reappraisal, the defence organisation has remained static. That is not good enough.
Primarily, it was intended, although it was not universally agreed, that this debate should rest upon the subject of manpower with which, of course, the right hon. Gentleman, as the Minister of Labour and National Service, is undoubtedly familiar. It is a pity that the Minister of Defence was not able to speak in the debate, because he would have spoken with authority on defence. How anybody, in any quarter of the House, could assume that it was possible to discuss manpower except in the context of defence organisation and preparation, I cannot understand. It is impossible to dissociate the two. I should have thought that that was obvious to everybody.
There has been some harsh criticism of the Government from my right hon. Friend the Member for Belper (Mr. G. Brown). I think that it has been quite justified, but I hope I may be forgiven for not pursuing that path. It seems to me that recriminations and harsh judgments are of little value if we are to come to a considered conclusion as to whether we require defence and, if we require it, what is the nature of that defence, what manpower we require and, what is perhaps more important, having regard to our extreme economic position, how much we can afford. I hope, if I can, to furnish a few constructive proposals which may help right hon. and hon. Members to make up


their minds. I say that with modesty. I have had some familiarity with the subject, as hon. Members know.
To begin with, let us take the question of manpower. What is the argument presented by the right hon. Gentleman and accepted by many of the newspapers and embodied in leading articles and, I should not be at all surprised, held to some extent on this side of the House? It is that, taking the figures and the facts as far as they are available, it will be impossible to abolish National Service at the end of 1958 so that the whole scheme would come to an end two years later. But surely that leaves out of account certain factors which must be familiar to hon. Members, namely, that it has been proved beyond a peradventure that the N.A.T.O. countries have never equitably shared the burdens of defence in respect of either manpower, research or weapons.
Moreover, the Minister gave me the cue. He spoke about Commonwealth defence. What is our interpretation of Commonwealth defence? It is that the Commonwealth countries make a contribution to the pool. But that has not happened. It is true that there have been indications of late that Australia has been prepared to share some of the burden of the Malayan defence position but, as far as actual, realistic, concrete Commonwealth defence is concerned it is, and has been for several years, conspicuous by its absence. On one occasion, as Minister of Defence, I presided over a Commonwealth defence conference when I ventured to indicate what should be done. Little has happened since then.
I suggest, as one of the constructive proposals, in order to lead up to the question of how soon we can deal with the abolition of National Service, that there is no reason at all why now, with an eased position in Malaya, the Australian Government should not take full charge of the situation in that territory. There is no reason at all. Australia is quite capable of doing it. Nor is there any reason why the Commonwealth countries should not accept their responsibilities as Commonwealth countries and as partners in other parts of overseas territories, for example, in Kenya or, if trouble should emerge, in the Middle East. The Union of South Africa, for a considerable time, has declared its intention, if trouble

should emerge in the Middle East, of rendering substantial help to the Commonwealth.
These are only a few of the ideas that relate to the subject of Commonwealth defence. In the measure that N.A.T.O. shares the equitable burden of defence so far as manpower is concerned, and the Commonwealth countries equally, it is possible to make an approach to the abolition of National Service within a specified period.
Here I want to reinforce the argument of my right hon. Friend the Member for Belper as to our intentions. There are, of course, bound to be various interpretations of the Opposition Motion. [HON. MEMBERS: "Hear, hear".] Confusion is not confined to the opposite benches. Naturally, on the subject of defence there is bound to be an element of confusion and, shall I say, agreeable misunderstanding in Labour ranks. We have, for example, what are called the extreme pacificts who, I am bound to say, are the most logical of all. They say, "Defence is useless, anyway. War does not solve any problem." But they ignore public opinion and the emotions of those people, however humble they may be, however lacking in intellectual quality, or in political consciousness who say, "The nation must have some defence, because we want security." After all, it is an insurance policy. The fire may never break out; nevertheless, one goes on paying. If the fire breaks out, one gets compensation in some form or another.

Mr. K. Zilliacus: The Government admit that if war breaks out this country cannot survive for 24 hours. What kind of insurance policy is that?

Mr. Shinwell: If I believed everything that the Government said it would be a different matter, but I have never believed all that the Government say, and that makes all the difference. In any event, I can deal with that matter on some other occasion. I have other fish to fry.
As I was saying, the extreme pacifists are logical. They say, "Away with it all." But I cannot understand the person who says, "Let us have defence because we require security, but cut down your defence costs." If we are to have defence it must be adequate and


efficient, otherwise better have none at all. I am in favour of defence. I do not want to see any weakening of our defence organisation. Why? I shall put it in a sentence, though so much could be said on this head—and I am not referring to the Secretary of State for War.
The world, strangely enough, is full of surprises—as we have just found out. Last week, the Prime Minister, speaking in a foreign affairs debate, said that the danger of war was receding. I doubt whether he would say that now that we have the Egyptian trouble and when Chinese troops have invaded Burma. We never can tell. With the best will in the world; with all our magnanimity in relation to the desire for peace, trouble could occur, and we have to be prepared for it in some form or other. Therefore, I do not advocate any weakening of our defence. But what I say is this: that we ought not to spend a single penny more than is absolutely essential, and that we ought not to waste the time of any man if it can be avoided. That is my indictment of the Government.
It could be argued against me—and my hon. Friend the Member for Dudley (Mr. Wigg), who takes perhaps a different line from myself on this matter, although I have trained him to the best of my ability—

Mr. Wigg: The opposite is true; I have trained my right hon. Friend.

Mr. Shinwell: Well, I hope that when the next Labour Government is formed, I may be elevated to the dignity of a Parliamentary Private Secretary to my hon. Friend who, no doubt, by that time will be Secretary of State for War.
In 1952, some of us put the case for a reduction in the period of National Service. May I relate, shortly, the historical narrative relating to this matter? Five years ago some of us—it is true, only a few of us—asked for a reduction in the period of National Service. Why? Because when there was tension in Europe, very high tension indeed, and when the Korean war broke out, we increased the period of National Service from 18 months to two years, but with a promise made by the Prime Minister of the day and by my right hon. Friend the Member for Dundee, West (Mr. Strachey), who was then Secretary of State for War,

and myself that at the end of the emergency we would revert to the 18 months' period.
So, in 1952, we said that the time had arrived when it was opportune to revert to 18 months' National Service. However, on no occasion did I venture to make a speech calling for a reduction in the period of National Service without demanding, at the same time, the re organisation of our defence preparations, and also demanding an exhaustive inquiry into the defence Services, because these two things were related.
Now the situation has changed. Let me indicate how it has changed. It has changed—and this is the view of the Government equally with the view expressed by this side of the House and by my right hon. Friend the Member for Belper this afternoon in the opening speech. There is a changed strategy. Of course, we want to retain conventional weapons and conventional ground forces to some extent, but there is a changed strategy which indicates that, should a major war emerge—I say a major war—whether we like it or not, and, of course, we do not like it; we deplore it and we certainly would deplore it if it ever occurred—there is no escape from what is much more than a possibility, the probability of nuclear weapons being used, no doubt causing wholesale devastation. We have to face that.
Conventional forces, therefore, are required only for what might be called a cold war, skirmishes, incidents of various kinds. Surely, however, it has now dawned upon the Government that for this purpose they do not require large bodies of ground troops. Why, even the leading articles in the newspapers, many of the writers of which have condemned the Labour Party for presenting this Motion, admit that there is no longer a case for large ground forces. Highly mobile, highly trained ground forces, yes, but this is not an original idea. We discussed this matter four or five years ago, and what has been done?
I said at the outset that I would not indulge in recriminations and in harsh judgments of the Government, but, really, they have not done too well. It may be the fault of their military advisers but, as far as one can gather, they have made no efforts to present a new policy based on the new strategy; and what is the


use of always talking about the new strategy, the new look, and the power and might of the new weapons in the event of war and, at the same time, doing nothing?
I say, therefore, that it is advisable to face up to the question of the abolition of National Service within a specified period, but I qualify that and, if necessary, I am prepared to place my own interpretation on the Opposition Motion, and make a further qualification. I do not say, and, frankly, I do not think that anyone in his senses can say with certainty, that we can abolish the call up in 1958, because we do not know; we have not got the information. What I do say, however, is that the Government ought to have a plan.
If the Government have a plan, for heaven's sake let them produce it so that we can examine it and debate it. But there is no such thing. For example, let me indicate the confusion which exists on the benches opposite. A few moments ago the Minister of Labour said that we require about 200,000 Regulars in the Army. But it is not so long ago since the Secretary of State for War, in a broadcast, when asked, "How many Regular men do you require in the Army if National Service is abolished?" replied, "Three hundred thousand."

Mr. Iain Macleod: I made it quite clear, both in my speech and again in response to an interjection from a back bench, that 200,000 is not my figure. I am not giving that. I adopted that from the Adjournment debate in which it was mentioned by the hon. Gentleman the Member for Dudley (Mr. Wigg), and from the opening speech of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Belper (Mr. G. Brown). It is not a Government figure in any sense of the word.

Mr. Shinwell: I do not like this adoption business. There is an element of illegitimacy about it. It seems to me that it would be far better for the right hon. Gentleman to make up his mind on the basis of information furnished to him by the Ministry of Defence and his own Department, and then tell us what he really expects.
The fact is that there is confusion. All that I want, and I am sure all that my hon. Friends on this side of the House want, is that, having regard to all the factors

involved—the question of finance, the waste of manpower, and the like; I do not want to go into details, because that is unnecessary—the Government ought to have a plan, a target. It is no use talking about a plan and a target which is nebulous in character—perhaps some day, if certain things happen, they may happen or they may not happen, then we will abolish National Service. It is not good enough. Present the plan. Perhaps the Government cannot present a plan? Well, more is the pity.
I leave the subject of manpower to come briefly to the second part of the Motion, dealing with the reduction in costs. I do it hoping to be forgiven, but if I am not it cannot be helped. On the general issue raised by my right hon. Friend the Member for Belper—I am sorry that he is not present, but he will hear about it—when he was arguing, as so many people do, that we can abolish National Service, get the Regulars required and pay them more—because that is all part of the picture—and, at the same time, reduce expenditure, I cannot agree. What is even worse, what I cannot understand—perhaps someone will explain it to me—is that the cost of weapons is rising all the time, and the right hon. Gentleman endorsed the point. Yet we are going to reduce expenditure. If that is so, then that simply cannot be done.
I will tell the House how it can be done. Indeed, that has been the challenge to us all the time; people have asked, "How are we to reduce expenditure by the £500 million suggested by my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Montgomery (Mr. C. Davies)?—and I have used the similar figure myself. I do not say that it is a certainty that we can reduce defence expenditure by £500 million or by about 6 per cent. of the national income by 1958. I do not say that it is certain, but I say that it is a target worth aiming at.
How can it be done? A number of people, in a number of leading articles, have said—these quidnuncs and wiseacres know so much about military matters—that the rockets, guided missiles and supersonic aircraft are bound to cost very large sums of money. Of course, it depends on the quantity one purchases or the number one needs. Does not everyone understand that one may produce a guided missile today and that


tomorrow it may be almost obsolete? Has that not been learnt in relation to aircraft? Is not that the case against producing too many aircraft? I do not agree with many of my hon. Friends and other people who say, "Go on producing bombers and swept-wing fighters" when I know as a result of my experience that not long after one has produced them something else comes along. One has to exercise caution and discretion in producing weapons of this kind because vast changes are taking place all the time.
As for the guided missiles, ballistic rockets and supersonic bombers, is it not time—this is not an original idea; it has been said very many times—that we allowed the United States to produce a lot of them which might ultimately be to our advantage instead of our burdening ourselves with the financial disadvantages? Why must we go on producing everything the United States has? We might emulate them in some things, but there is no reason why we should, in the end, bring upon ourselves financial disaster. The same thing applies to research.
I now come to the subject of N.A.T.O. N.A.T.O. in the military sense is deplorably weak. I had something to do with the emergence and development of N.A.T.O., and I deplore the fact that it is weak. What are the facts about N.A.T.O.? Why is it weak? It is weak today for precisely the same reason that it was weak when I was Minister of Defence, namely, the inability of the French to meet their European obligations. I am not complaining about that; the French have Algeria to deal with. We may have views on whether it is right or wrong to engage in the Algerian dispute, but the French, nevertheless, have that on their hands. Algeria has absorbed so many troops that France is quite incapable of making a reasonable contribution to N.A.T.O. In those days when I was Minister of Defence in the Labour Government, we had a similar difficulty with France, because France put ever so many divisions on paper, but that was where they remained.
I will tell the House something now which has, perhaps, never occurred to it. What was the primary reason for the proposal for German rearmament? It was a bolt from the blue. It was because

it was realised by the Foreign Ministers concerned, and by the Defence Ministers who were called into consultation, that the French could not meet their commitments, and we had to look for an alternative. That is why the suggestion about German rearmament was first made. I am bound to say that, after all these years, German rearmament still seems a long way off, and it is doubtful whether, when it emerges, it will be a suitable alternative to the French divisions which we thought at the outset we were likely to get.
Nevertheless, N.A.T.O. is a potential of great strength if, some day, a nuclear war should occur. I repeat that we all hope that one will never occur, but if it should, there is a potential. Do not let us forget that N.A.T.O. has been responsible for some remarkable achievements. The Berlin airlift came just about the time when N.A.T.O. was being created. As the right hon. Gentleman opposite rightly said, N.A.T.O. has, perhaps, held off the danger of war.
What are we to do about N.A.T.O.? I will tell the right hon. Gentleman what ought to be done, and I hope that he will tell the Minister of Defence. There ought to be discussions with N.A.T.O., and these discussions should take the form, first, of deciding whether we can build up an adequate defence on the basis of equity between the countries in proportion to their strength, their financial position and the like.
Secondly, there must at long last be a pooling of research and standardisation. We have waited for it a long time. France should be told that it is no use her producing Mystèe aircraft if we can produce a suitable type of aircraft. Equally, we ought not to be producing bazookas and armoured vehicles when we know that the French can produce a better bazooka than ours and an armoured vehicle far superior to anything produced here. That is the way to handle it. Then we should have a real N.A.T.O. organised for the purpose for which it was intended.
I have a final point to put about N.A.T.O. Even if N.A.T.O. fails in a military sense, the fact that we can bring together fifteen countries, although they may sometimes be confused and troubled in their minds, and although they may sometimes disagree, is a great achievement in itself for the purposes of real


peace some day and for the purposes of social advancement throughout Europe as a whole. That is why we want N.A.T.O. I know how weak it is in a military sense, but I do not make a song and dance about it. N.A.T.O. ought to be encouraged, and we should use it for the purpose of reducing our expenditure and reducing the need for such vast manpower requirements.
There is the case, and that is why the Motion is justifiable. The Motion says, in effect, "We do not expect you to do this at the end of 1958, but we hope you will plan towards it. We do not expect that you will be able to reduce your expenditure by a substantial amount, much less by £500 million, but we think you should aim at it, and, if you have not an aim, it is better that you should get out altogether." After all, that is not a harsh judgment on the Government.
The right hon. Gentleman opposite challenges us on the basis of figures, almost arrogantly, saying, "If hon. Gentlemen opposite can prove their case—". The right hon. Gentleman says that only because he does not really understand the case which has to be put. He has had figures presented to him, and thinks that that is all that is required. On the basis of figures, one can prove anything at all, particularly in relation to the Army. One can leave it to the generals. One has only to put a case to them, and they will produce the figures. I had an instance in 1929, when I was asked by the Secretary of State for War, Mr. Thomas Shaw, to bring about a reduction in armaments expenditure. I went to the generals, and we had a committee, and they proved that I was completely wrong, although I got my way in the end. The reason why I got my way was that I knew nothing about figures. That is my reply to my hon. Friend the Member for Dudley.
I submit to the right hon. Gentleman that there is a case for the Motion, and it ought to be accepted by the Government. If the Government had been wise, they would have said, "The Motion is not, after all, so specific in character as some people have made out. We must put a liberal interpretation upon it, and we will accept it." We should then all be good friends for the time being, and we could face up to the new problem which

has emerged in relation to Egypt. That is what the Government should have done, but they have failed to do so, and we shall go into the Lobby against them tonight.

6.10 p.m.

Mr. John Maclay: I must confess that when one realised that a debate on this subject was to take place this week one had an impression that there might be an air of unreality about it. I cannot say that any speech made so far has completely removed that impression.
The right hon. Gentleman the Member for Belper (Mr. G. Brown), in a very effective speech, set about making it cleat that the way any normal person would read the Opposition's Motion was not the way in which the Opposition's Motion was meant to be read. The right hon. Member for Easington (Mr. Shinwell) came valiantly to his rescue at the last possible moment. For a long time I could not make out what he could do for the right hon. Member for Belper, but he managed to screw himself up to say that it was a good Motion and should be accepted.
The right hon. Member for Easington made one point with which I agreed very substantially. That was when he was dealing with the possibility of certain reductions in defence expenditure which could come from better standardisation and a better division of labour among the N.A.T.O. Allies. I remind the right hon. Gentleman and other hon. Members opposite, as well as the Government, that it is not only in N.A.T.O. that there are possibilities of standardisation. N.A.T.O. is not the only structure for working on standardisation. I suspect that certain work can be done in this country itself, but there is also the very important Standing Armaments Committee of Western European Union about which there was a lot of talk some years ago but which too few people now remember. That Committee, working with seven nations, may well do better work on standardisation than N.A.T.O. can with the larger number of nations, and the maximum possible use should be made of it.
I will detain the House for only a very short time, because this is an extremely difficult time rationally to discuss the detail of manpower and defence. The


point I am anxious to stress in intervening is that the rumours, the reports in the Press and speeches by hon. Members, possibly on both sides of the House, over recent months have produced a fairly dangerous state of affairs abroad. The one reason I welcome the debate today—I assumed even before the events of the last few days that it must be an unreal debate at this stage of this year—is that it has given the Government an opportunity to make it absolutely clear that in Britain we do not intend to take unilateral decisions on defence matters without the fullest consultation with our Allies and without full consideration of the implications of any revision of strategy which becomes possible in the near future. There has been doubt about that in the country and abroad which has done great harm.
I also welcome the explanation of the right hon. Member for Belper of the Opposition's Motion. When the Motion appeared it came as a climax to the kind of talk which has been causing so much trouble all over the world. Reading the Motion, without a running commentary from the right hon. Member for Belper, would lead one to believe that the Labour Party's intention to fix a date for the last call up is as clear as can be. That conclusion has been picked up by the Press, particularly when coupled with reports of a Labour Party meeting issued, I believe, in the form of a Press release. I have read in one newspaper, which is very friendly towards the other side of the House, the statement that Labour will cut the period of National Service. That kind of stuff is believed. I am told that the Motion does not necessarily mean that, but even the explanation of what it meant by the right hon. Member for Belper led him into some very strange byways of argument.
He made it clear—and I respect him for it and welcome it—that the Labour Party does not wish to make unilateral decisions on National Service until there have been discussions with our Allies. However, in the latter part of his speech it was extraordinarily difficult to find out just what those discussions were to do. I will confine myself to emphasising the kind of damage which has been done abroad by these rumours.
Whether we like it or not—and we should be proud of it—Britain remains the

focal point of the moral strength of the free Western Powers and with the Commonwealth we are the essential link between the United States and the other free Western nations.
On what we do in a period of very difficult ad critical reappraisal may well depend what all the other nations of Western Europe do, and on our action may therefore depend the future of world peace. Do not let us forget for one minute in our domestic squabbles on politics and our desire to take up political positions on these matters of defence that, above all, the whole world is watching Britain. It will continue to do so, unless we show that we are unworthy of our position in the world.
The temptation to Britain to ease off in her defence preparations at this time must obviously be very great, but do nor let us make suggestions such as one which has been heard too often in recent weeks that because the French do not have their full strength on the Continent, because they are engaged elsewhere, we should not keep four divisions in Germany. That is as damaging as the kind of rumour that Britain intends to weaken her full obligations in Europe just because one of our European Allies is having difficulties in her overseas possessions.

Mr. Paget: Who said that?

Mr. Maclay: I am not accusing any individual hon. Member of saying that, but no one will deny that there has been a lot of talk about it in Press articles and the like and it has been a too easy line of approach to solving some of our problems.

Mr. Paget: The right hon. Gentleman and I have a very great interest in this debate. I agree that our N.A.T.O. obligations are sacrosanct. There is no question about that. I certainly believe that we can fulfil our N.A.T.O. obligations and strengthen ourselves by doing that. That is the difference between us.

Mr. Maclay: I think I made it clear that I very much welcome what has been said, but I am stressing the damage done by the kind of rumour which has got about in past weeks. It is very widespread, and any hon. Member in touch with Continental matters will agree that the mood there has become that Britain is seriously thinking of a reduction of its forces.
I should like to say a few words about our commitments with N.A.T.O.—the commitment of four divisions and the Tactical Air Force. We must remember that that commitment was made as an integral part of the Paris Agreements. We have further to remember just what those Paris Agreements were intended to do. I have had to argue this in the House once before, although today there is no argument on the subject. It was not just a question of getting 12 German divisions. The Paris Agreements were not created for that purpose, although it was undoubtedly extremely important. The Paris Agreements and the British commitment which made them possible also involved the whole French attitude to any form of rearmament in Germany. Our commitment of four divisions was involved in that.
Another, and, I believe, the most important, element in the Paris Agreements was the long-term effect on Europe of the fact that Britain was formally committed to the continent of Europe in a way which had never been seen before in peace time. Had the European nations been certain in 1912, 1913, or 1914 of what Britain would do in the event of an outbreak of war, had we had troops there in 1934, 1935, 1936, or 1937, it is not going too far to say that the chances of both those wars happening would have been substantially reduced.
Do not let us believe that because there is an argument—I will not say more than that at the moment—that the immediate risk of physical aggression in Europe has diminished, there is therefore a case for our reducing our commitments. Having said that, I of course entirely agree that four divisions and the Tactical Air Force are not necessarily the final word on what we should have on the Continent in terms of manpower. Clearly the governing words in the Paris Agreements are those which the right hon. Member for Belper has already quoted. I want to emphasise what the exact wording is. It is:
Her Majesty The Queen of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland will continue to maintain on the mainland of Europe, including Germany, the effective strength of the United Kingdom forces which are now assigned to the Supreme Allied Commander, Europe, that is to say, four divisions and the Second Tactical Air Force, or such other forces as the Supreme Allied Commander, Europe, regards as having equivalent fighting capacity. Her Majesty undertakes not

to withdraw those forces against the wishes of the majority of the High Contracting Parties who should take their decision in the knowledge of the views of the Supreme Allied Commander, Europe.
I have quoted that in full because I regard it as necessary to re-emphasise the nature of that commitment.
It is possible—and I sincerely hope that it will happen quickly—that there will be a more effective reappraisal of the way to implement those words. All I would say upon that is that we should be certain that our Allies in Western Europe, in addition to those on the other side of the Atlantic—and I mean not merely the Governments but the peoples of those countries—realise that if there is a change in the divisional strength, it will be one which is fully acceptable to the military technicians who have been carrying out the reappraisal of the way in which we can most effectively implement the spirit, which is what matters, of the Paris Agreements.
I have only one other very brief comment to make. Very few people in this country wish to see National Service prolonged for one day longer than is necessary, but I have been unable to convince myself that it is reasonable or sensible to give a date for the last call-up, in the foreseeable future. This question has various angles. I am going to leave alone its effect upon our own Forces, but I want to say a word about the effect abroad of any kind of talk that we are putting an end to conscription.
We have to remember that the idea of many of our Continental Allies as to the best way to maintain an effective peacetime military strength is based entirely upon National Service. I have had many talks about this matter with my Continental friends, and have found the greatest difficulty in getting them to understand that here, in Britain, the theory of how to get the most efficient fighting force with the minimum waste of manpower, and at the minimum cost is ultimately, and always must be, founded upon a voluntary basis.
I beseech hon. Members on both sides of the House to remember that that point of view is not shared by many of our Continental Allies, whose history for many years past, of producing military strength in peace-time has been based upon National Service. Therefore, when


our Continental Allies hear talk of the abolition of National Service, unqualified by very careful reservations as to how we shall maintain our strength, the feeling develops that Britain is going to run out of her commitments. I say in all seriousness that the combination of the rumour of the end of National Service in this country with the rumour of the withdrawing of divisions has caused very serious trouble throughout Europe.
With the removal of some of the fear of Russian aggression in Europe—an attitude which I believe may well have gone too far, because, quite apart from the events of the last few days, one must not discount the possibility of Russian infiltration movements in Europe—new dangers can develop. We are anxious to cut down defence expenditure and to economise in the use of Service manpower. So also is every nation in Western Europe. If it is thought that the rumours to which I have referred have real substance, then there is the gravest danger of action in other nations which could leave Europe virtually defenceless.
I urge all hon. Members to remember that in talking of what we all so much desire—economy in manpower and cost in meeting our defence needs—what goes out from this House and what is published in newspapers as intelligent guesswork is being watched with the utmost care abroad, and can create a completely wrong impression of the determination of hon. Members on both sides of the House to maintain our obligations to our Allies up to the hilt.

6.35 p.m.

Mr. F. J. Bellenger: It is, no doubt, very comforting for some of those Allies to whom the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Renfrew, West (Mr. J. Maclay) has just referred to look to Britain to carry all the burdens, both physically and morally, but the fact remains that they are not carrying a fair proportion. If we are to accept the principle of National Service—which the Labour Government enunciated after the war, for the first time in peace time, as a vital principle—it seems to me that some of our Continental Allies have failed very badly. And not only our Continental Allies; what about the British Commonwealth? Is that to sit back and deliver

lectures, such as the right hon. Gentleman told us he has listened to from his friends on the other side of the Channel? Has New Zealand or Canada got conscription?
Where is Britain expected to stand? Are we to provide the wherewithal to fight the battles of the world, which are just as much the battles of our Continental Allies and Commonwealth relatives? Whatever the right hon. Gentleman may say as to the effect of what we say in this House, we all represent our constituents, and most of our people are discontented and to some degree resentful at the fact that National Service, which is selective and is at present limited to a comparatively small proportion of young men, is apparently to continue in perpetuity. Our constituents want that situation ended as soon as possible. The only question is when it should be ended.
Is there any difference between the Government and the Opposition in this matter? If so, let the Government say so. Do they want to perpetuate military conscription and the direction of labour, or not? If not, they have come somewhere near the point of view which we are putting. The only difference is as to the timing of the ending of conscription. That is what our Motion refers to and what the Government evades by their Amendment.
I was really entranced by the figures given to us by the Minister of Labour, and the way in which he manipulated them. I believe that at one time he was a bridge expert. The essence of writing about bridge is that one shows the hands of all four players—North, East, South and West—in the same article. But today he kept very nicely hidden up his sleeve some of the hands and some of the trumps. He knows that in taking a guesswork figure he has not disclosed to us the assessment of the Chiefs of Staff. All he has done is to take figures which have appeared in the Estimates, which are based upon what the Chiefs of Staff say they want in order to carry out the commitments, and then proceed to say that it is not possible to have a minimum of 450,000 men in the three Services without National Service.
My argument is that we do not want all those men. The right hon. Gentleman will say, "You are pitting yourself against the General Staff." I should not think of doing so for one moment, but


I should like to hear what are the assessments of the General Staff, which we have not heard yet. The Secretary of State for War has been very coy about telling us what are our real commitments. I wish to refer to the speech he made a few nights ago. In spite of all that the Minister of Labour said, this is an Army matter. In confirmation of that statement, I should like to quote the Secretary of State's own words when my hon. Friend the Member for Dudley (Mr. Wigg) "jumped the gun" the other night, on 23rd July. He said:
It is true that the main user and the main justification for National Service at present is the Army."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 23rd July, 1956; Vol. 556, c. 171.]
I do not think that the right hon. Gentleman can accuse me of unfairness if I base my arguments upon the Army position. I can certainly argue better about the Army than about the other two Services. I think that many hon. Members are beginning to doubt whether the claims made by the Royal Navy are justified, but I am not capable of putting arguments for or against that. Perhaps it might be better if it were put in the defence debate which we are promised when we come back.
What the Secretary of State further told us was that the Army would far rather have fewer men and an all-Regular Army. I agree, and I suppose most of us would agree. The right hon. Gentleman went on to say that the Army would be far happier and healthy if it was an all-Regular Army. I agree there, also, and that is about the limit of my agreement with the right hon. Gentleman. I would only ask why, if that is so, he does not get on with it and produce an all-Regular Army?
The right hon. Gentleman says that he cannot get the recruits even under the improved conditions, but he has not told us once what is the minimum number of his Regular Army and what number he can do with. Small surprise, therefore, that my right hon. Friend the Member for Belper (Mr. G. Brown) has to hazard a guess. He talks about 200,000. I talk about less, and I am going to try to show that we can do with less, if we compare today's strength with what we had in pre-war days.
The real reason why we have National Service is because of the saying, now over

150 years old, that the big battalions count. I believe it was Napoleon who said it, but he was the originator of conscription, and the whole hierarchy of generals and general staffs ever since have based their claims on the same maxim, that the big battalions count, and have, therefore, said that they must have the largest possible number of men. I do not blame them. Obviously, if one has a large margin or reserve of manpower, it is much more possible to win battles. I agree that in warfare that maxim may be true, but in peace-time it cannot be true, because we have not got the economy which can stand the complete mobilisation of manpower such as we have in the Army.
Hardly ever has the Army attempted to economise with manpower such as civilian employers of labour have had to do in different branches of industry. What the Army has been doing, and it has been doing it for ten years or more, since the end of the war, has been working on maximum figures instead of on minimum figures. I regret to say that many industrialists have been doing the same. That is probably why we are having some of the trouble today, when this system is being reversed under pressure from the Chancellor of the Exchequer, and industrialists are being forced to "cough up" a lot of that surplus manpower which they got at the expense of the consumer, just as National Service is at the cost of the taxpayer.
The whole trouble does not lie with the General Staff. It lies with Governments, and I make no distinction between this Government and preceding ones. Obviously, the staffs say "What is it that you want us to do?" and the Government—and I regret to have to include previous Governments—have asked for an outsize suit to be made. The military tailors have, therefore, said, "Very well, then, we want so much cloth." The commitments which the politicians and the Government have placed on the Services have caused the Services to demand the largest amount of cloth. It is quite obvious, and it must be so, that we cannot hope alone in the distant stations to try to police the world, because that is what Britain is trying to do.
We are not producing the best form of defence. We have only to look around


the world. In Cyprus, we have 16,000 or 17,000 men, and they are not even producing law and order there. Twelve of the 14 major units about which the Secretary of State was speaking in the debate on the Army Estimates are being used to try to maintain law and order, and are not able to do it.
Something must be wrong somewhere, because, as far as I can judge, there are no tremendous military forces arrayed against our troops in Cyprus. Their opponents are largely rebellious civilians, many of them amateurs, even in their bomb making and bomb throwing. So it seems to me that there is something entirely wrong with our military system, which forces us to keep in different parts of the world large numbers of men merely to maintain law and order.
I have not the time to go into the question of how it can be done, but I should like to remind the Minister—not the Minister of Labour, because it is outside his sphere, but perhaps the Under-Secretary of State for War—that we were able to recruit a large and efficient Indian Army by brigading British troops with local troops, a system which, as hon. and gallant Gentlemen will know, was to have one brigade of British troops with two brigades of Indian troops forming the division. I am not at all sure, although I have no doubt that the Secretary of State for War will say that we have argued this matter almost ad nauseam, that that system could not be operated with many of the colonial populations in order to maintain, not perhaps a fighting Army, but certainly a very good gendarmerie to maintain law and order in these territories without us having to send large numbers of British troops to scattered parts of the world.
I want now to concentrate on a comparison which I maintain is relevant and certainly germane to the present situation. Before the war, what was the size of the British Army? I have here some very interesting figures, which I had prepared when I was at the War Office. They are figures which disagree with those which my hon. Friend the Member for Dudley gave the other night. My hon. Friend referred to a Regular Army of 180,000 or 190,000 before the war. I think, from the figures which he showed me, that he included the British element in the Indian Army, but the

figures which I have here relate to between 1923 and 1927, when we had fewer than 150,000 all ranks in the British Army. From 1928 to 1937—and let the House note that this is four years after Hitler came to power, with all the trouble that he was causing us—the British Army never exceeded much more than 134,000 all ranks—a Regular Army. We had no conscription in those days.

Mr. Ian Harvey: Would not the right hon. Gentleman agree that Hitler did not cause anybody any serious trouble until 1937, but that, when he did start, the fact that we had not the necessary military strength contributed to the successes which he gained?

Mr. Bellenger: I have a memory which goes back before the First World War—which dates me somewhat—but the symptoms were much the same, and the British Regular Army was much the same then as it was according to the figures I am now giving to the House.
We had the Kaiser and the German military junta creating trouble, and everybody knew that war was almost inevitable; and we knew the same when Hitler came to power in 1933. The only unfortunate thing was that most hon. Gentlemen on the Government side of the House in those days would never admit it. I will give the hon. Member for Harrow, East (Mr. Ian Harvey) some figures. The hon. Gentleman talks about 1937, when Hitler first became really dangerous. The average number of Regulars of all ranks in the British Army during 1937 was 134,043, and it was only in 1938, when we first brought in conscription, or the militia, as it then was, that the figure rose to 210,000. Right up to 1937—this is the point I am making-Britain, with her commitments all over the world, and with trouble brewing in Europe, managed to have an Army of only 134,000 all ranks.

Mr. Iain Macleod: Surely the important thing is that whether males are serving in the Army, the Navy or the Air Force at home or abroad, so long as they are British troops they come from the same pool of young men coming up to 18. From there, we have to meet all the commitments of all the Services.

Mr. Bellenger: I maintain that the right hon. Gentleman has proved too much. Where did they come from in


the period from 1923–1937? Were the age classes much different in those days? I think that the number of young men reaching the age of 18 is higher now. I do not know, but the right hon. Gentleman can confirm that or deny it. I am saying, and the right hon. Gentleman has confirmed it, that right back to the 1860s the pattern of Regular recruiting has been the same.
All that the right hon. Gentleman is saying is that today circumstances have changed because we have full employment. I admit that, but I say that there is a similar situation in France. According to The Times military correspondent the size of the French regular forces, at any rate at the beginning of this year, was no more than 28,000 officers and 112,000 other ranks, a total of 140,000. What did the French have to do in order to fight their colonial war? They had to call up the reserves.
I suggest that, rather than keeping a large number of National Service men, which the Secretary of State for War has told us makes the Army unhealthy and unhappy, it would be far better to get rid of them. If the occasion arises—I will not say that it will not, because it has happened before—we could call up the reserves. Why do we have all these reserves? The purpose of the original National Service Act, passed in 1947, after the war, was to create trained reserves. We must have hundreds of thousands of reserves.
If the situation becomes really serious in the Suez area, we shall have to call up the reserves. That would be in addition to National Service which does not provide, even today, the Army needed to deal with those commitments about which we were only told in part. What conclusion do I draw from these facts and figures which I have given to the House? On 23rd July, the Secretary of State estimated that were the call-up dropped in 1958, as we are asking, we should then have about 120,000 to 130,000 Regulars in 1961. The right hon. Gentleman is on record as having said that, and no doubt he will remember it. He said:
That would give us a total in the Army, in 1961, of between 120,000 and 130,000."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 24th July, 1956; Vol. 557, c. 174.]

The right hon. Gentleman went on to say that the tank would not be full until 1965 and, therefore, on his own argument, the figures for 1965 should be larger than for 1961. So, over the ten years because it is roughly ten years, the right hon. Gentleman is sure—so far as he can be sure of anything—of more than 143,000 all ranks. His figures referred to other ranks and I am allowing 10 per cent. for officers, which he said was the ratio between officers and other ranks.
By 1965, we should have at least 150,000 in the Regular Army. I put it to the right hon. Gentleman; would he not rather have 150,000 well-trained, efficient, men in a "healthy" Regular Army instead of what he has today, an Army half of which is composed of National Service men, which he himself admits is a deterrent to Regular recruiting? If one talks to any officers—well, perhaps not the senior officers, but officers of the rank of company commander and perhaps even brigadier—what do they say? I am not referring to the brigadiers in this House, because they are retired. I am referring to the serving brigadiers. They say, "We would far rather have Regular troops, even with smaller units, than National Service men, who cause considerable discontent among our Regulars, especially the married men." I can well believe that.
The other day my hon. Friend the Member for Dudley mentioned something about household troops, a battalion of the Brigade of Guards I think it was, being glad to increase its strength to 550—

Mr. Wigg: My right hon. Friend may be in some danger, because he is giving away party secrets. I said that at a party meeting.

Mr. Bellenger: I am sorry if I have transgressed the bounds of propriety so far as party politics is concerned, but this is not such a secret as my hon. Friend may think, because he said it outside the party meeting.

Mr. Wigg: And I hope to say it again later.

Mr. Bellenger: My hon. Friend admits that a Guards' battalion was glad to get its strength up to 550 because it knew, as I know, from the experience of two world wars that one volunteer is worth


three pressed men. Let hon. Members think back to the First World War. What was produced by the numbers of men to which I have referred? Strangely enough, four British divisions were produced to form the British Expeditionary Force and look what an account they gave of themselves against the hordes thrown at them by the Kaiser's Army.
I am asking the Secretary of State to accept a smaller number of more contented men in a healthier and Regular Army. It is true that the right hon. Gentleman will not have such a large number of men to squander in the way he is doing at present, all over the globe. I am not so much worried by the commitment in Germany. I think it could be smaller, but I do not mind a large part of our Army being in Germany. I look upon the British contingent in Germany as being home-based, because that is what it really is. There are far better training grounds for them in Germany than they are likely to get here, and far better barrack accommodation than in this country.
When we brought back the troops formerly in the Canal Zone, what did we do with them? We had to put them into sub-standard barracks which are already overcrowded. If they were asked most young soldiers, National Service men as well as Regulars would say—certain other things being equal such as home ties in certain cases—that they would far rather be in Germany than in this country.
The British Army in Germany is probably the best part of the Army in the world. I do not wish to deny the usefulness or efficiency of other forces which are being hard-pressed in Kenya, Malaya or Cyprus, but I say that as a fighting machine the British Army in Germany is probably the best we have had for a very long time. Therefore, I do not mind those troops being in Germany. All I ask is that the number be reduced, and it could be reduced. The coming into operation of the German troops will make a tremendous difference. All along I have supported, first, E.D.C., and, later, the Paris Treaty, sometimes in disagreement with or opposition to members of my own party, because I foresaw the time when the German Army would be resuscitated and become a first-class fighting force.
The Russians know it. They are not likely to try any tricks in Europe as long as the German forces are there. At the end of this year, five German divisions will have come into being under the conscription law passed through the Bundestag. They will be in cadre form and consist of Regular troops. By next year it is hoped they will have about ten divisions, not fully complete. As one of my hon. Friends has said, the British Army is not by any means up to full establishment.
In giving these comparisons between pre-war and post-war years, I maintain that the situation has not changed. We know about the 175 Russian divisions, but if we have to keep that in front of us constantly and use it as an argument, we shall never do away with National Service. Indeed, we shall need far larger forces than we have at present. We can never hope to cope with them. We must take risks. If the Russian armies were to march now they could come straight to the Channel ports.
The right hon. Gentleman knows that they could. Soldiers of the status of General Gruenther have told us so. General Gruenther said that with the 12 divisions of the German army we could hold such an attack by the Russians. We cannot separate our problems of manpower from the support given by our Allies. If we attempt to argue this matter in isolation, as we seem to be trying to do today, the Government will have it all their own way. I do not attempt to argue the matter in that way.
We have two things today that we did not have before the last war. We did not have the substantial quantities of United States troops, aeroplanes and equipment which are here, ready to meet any attack or act of aggression. I ask hon. Gentlemen not to under-assess them. We must rely upon our Allies to do part of this job. Secondly, we have a German Ally. Our soldiers know that the Germans can fight if the occasion arises. We hope that it will not arise. I hope that these forces will prevent war. If war comes, let us make no mistake; these puny forces will have to be increased.
There is one matter which affects the command of B.A.O.R. which comes under the Secretary of State for War, and which makes me suspicious of some of


the arguments of the General Staff. Matters of policy should be decided by the Government. It should not rest with military commanders, even as eminent as General Sir Richard Gale to make statements like that which he made on 24th July in an interview which he gave to The Times. I suppose that most hon. Members noticed what he said. It was that the German Chancellor, Dr. Adenauer, was quite right in his assessment of the situation. He said a lot of other things, too.
It is wrong for a serving officer to endorse the policy of a foreign government when it may embarrass his own Government, as it would if our Motion were carried. When I put a Question to the Minister of Defence on the matter today, his answer was:
It is not the customary practice for my authority to be sought for what is to be said at interviews of the kind referred to by the right hon. Gentleman.
If General Gale had views on those matters, he should have represented them to the Secretary of State for War or to the Army Council. He should not broadcast ideas that conflict with those of many right hon. and hon. Gentlemen in this House and may conflict with those of members of his own Government He should keep them for the proper channel.
Whatever hon. Gentlemen may say about the size of our Forces, let them remember that if we give the Army the cloth it will tailor a good military suit, even though small. It has always done so, and will always be able to do so. The trouble is that Governments ask the Army to make an outsize suit of clothes with inadequate cloth. Most of the Army is today resisting the claims that are made about what it should do with the National Service men.
I say to the Government, "Get rid of conscription, whether by 1958 or 1960." I support the Motion on the same ground as does my right hon. Friend the Member for Belper. We must get on with planning the abolition of National Service at some time. I know that we have to do it in consultation with our Allies, but many of them have done things without consulting us, and none of them has two years' military conscription today. The new German Army will do no more than 18 months. The case which I have put—and which, in regard

to the Army, is based on the arguments advanced by the Secretary of State for War on the Adjournment Motion the other day—are worthy of consideration.
If the right hon. Gentleman says that our commitments need more than 130,000 or 150,000 men, let him come out into the open and say so, and tell us what minimum he needs. Then we shall be able to assess the position. We have not been told it tonight despite the display of figures, which may mean a lot or little, which was advanced by the Minister of Labour in trying to demolish all our arguments in favour of our Motion.

7.7 p.m.

Brigadier Sir John Smyth: The right hon. Member for Bassetlaw (Mr. Bellenger) has made an extremely interesting speech. I am very much in agreement with many of the things that he said. But it was not a valid argument to take the strength of the British Regular Army before 1914 and again before 1939, and to deduce from that what the size of the Regular Army should be today.
I was interested in one point he made about the Indian Army, in which I served for many years. He was speaking of the dilution of units. But when he mentioned the strength of the Regular British Army between the two wars, he did not mention that we then had a very large and efficient Indian Army which could provide an expeditionary force of four divisions, quite apart from internal security troops and other troops that remained behind in India and Burma.

Mr. Bellenger: I was speaking mainly of India and Burma.

Sir J. Smyth: The big factor was the expeditionary force of four divisions.
I am very impressed with the unanimity on both sides of the House today on most of the important questions of defence. We differ on this rather rigid question of the doing away with National Service definitely by a certain date. The Government are asked to end the call-up in December, 1958, irrespective of the military situation at the time and of how we fit in with the arrangement of our Allies. That is a big point of difference. Otherwise, as the Minister of Labour has said, there is a great deal of agreement on major policy.
The debate takes place in the shadow of the Suez situation. It is a good thing that it has come now because it dovetails with the debate tomorrow on that situation. It should be brought home to everybody—if it is not already appreciated—that whatever our arrangements may be with regard to a global war, we ought to believe even more firmly than before that adequate conventional forces are absolutely essential today. Great wars, like great fires, generally start from small beginnings, and I am firmly of the opinion that if one can deal with these small conflagrations in their early form we shall avoid a great deal of trouble that we have failed to avoid in the past. The lesson of Suez is: let us always try to be one jump ahead and not two jumps behind.
I am also of the opinion that security and strength in the conventional weapon war, or the cold war, or whatever one likes to call it, depend very much on having central reserves which are uncommitted to any other rôle and which can be air transported to any threatened area at the shortest notice. It used to be said that a tank force exerted its greatest strength when it was out of sight over the horizon, and I think that is very true in a situation like Suez. The little Hitlers of this world do not start anything unless they think they can get away with it. I think that is a very important factor to bear in mind.
The points on which I think we are in absolute agreement on both sides of the House are these. First, I think we all agree that security and the preservation of peace are all important to us and to the rest of the world. They are our first priority, and we must continually bear that fact in mind. Nothing is of any value—our efforts to improve our standard of life, to help the backward peoples, or anything of that sort—if we are living under the threat of any sort of war. Our British defence must always be a compromise between what we would like to have—100 per cent. security—and what we can afford. That has always been and still is the case today.
The second point on which we are all agreed is that the defence budget as it is today in money, material and manpower is a very grievous burden to this country and weighs very heavily upon us indeed. I know that my right hon. Friends the Prime Minister and the Chancellor of the

Exchequer have that fact very much in mind, and we all want to do everything we can to reduce that burden.
The third point on which I believe there is general agreement is National Service. I do not believe there is any difference on either side of the House. We all want to do away with National Service at the earliest possible moment, as soon as the world security position permits. National Service in peacetime is contrary to our British tradition, and we have had it for over ten years. Also it is entirely inefficient in this modern age. It is a waste of manpower. It takes a lot of men to keep the National Service men trained, and they in themselves create a waste of shipping which is needed to take them to and fro. We cannot call them up for less than two years, and there is no doubt that we all agree that we should do away with National Service as soon as possible.
National Service does not fit in with our modern defence problems. In the old days, to which the right hon. Member for Bassetlaw was referring, one wanted to build up large reserves. That is not the case today. I believe that the bulk of our goods must be in the shop window if we are to prevent a war, and not merely to try and win one once it has started.
The problem before us today is how we in the British Commonwealth, with our Allies, can reduce our expenditure on defence and yet increase its efficiency. I agree very much with the right hon. Member for Easington (Mr. Shinwell) who said that we do not want to reduce the strength of our defence; we want to increase it by different methods.
We live in an age of the H-bomb deterrent. I want to talk only for one moment on global war, because that is a subject which is rather apart and on its own. All I would say about the deterrent is that it must be effective. The deterrent that we have must be absolutely up-to-date and thoroughly tested. That is why I think it is poor economy not to have proper tests of our H-bomb. I appreciate the fears that we all have in this respect, and, having tested our H-bomb, for goodness sake let us come to an agreement with the other world Powers which have this weapon to limit our test explosions. The arrangements for the use-of the H-bomb must be perfect, and in conjunction with the United States and our


other Allies the arrangements must not only be perfect but known to be perfect.
I believe that a global war is far less likely to occur today than at any time probably in our memory. But our object must surely be to prevent any sort of war from starting, because from small beginnings a great war may start. In this age of the deterrent I think that a shelter is provided for the little Hitlers, the Nassers and dictators who take advantage of the fact that this is a hydrogen bomb age and who think that they can commit acts of aggression which we shall be either too humane or too preoccupied to deal with or which we shall not have the conventional forces to counter.
The right hon. Member for Easington mentioned a matter of Commonwealth defence in which I found myself in considerable agreement with what he said. Just before the end of the war, I wrote a little book on this subject. It is now out of print and is of no significance, but it was called "Defence is our Business". It was a treatise on that very subject of Commonwealth defence—how can we use the forces of our Commonwealth to increase our overall strength and reduce our British commitment in manpower? My scheme was that we should have three bases—in Great Britain, in the Mediterranean and in the Far East—and that in each of these bases we should have a minimum number of men employed in static defence, tied down to the ground, and the maximum number for use in a mobile rôle.
I do not think we are really doing that today. I agree with the right hon. Member for Easington. Every member of the Commonwealth ought today to have a certain number of brigades, even if only one or two, equipped and ready to play their part in this rôle of mobile defence by means of air transport which could enable them to join up with other units. It is, of course, a tragedy today that our magnificent Indian Army that was such a strength in the Eastern part of the world is making no contribution to the maintenance of the peace of the world. That, to my mind, is a great tragedy. We all know the reason. It is that they are unable to resolve the quarrel over Kashmir. The result is that both India and Pakistan are maintaining forces greater than they can really afford, which

are making no contribution to peace but simply glaring at one another from either side of the Kashmir border.
I was very disappointed that, so far as I could see, at the meeting of Commonwealth Prime Ministers no progress was made on that vital problem. I hope that if they can resolve it India and Pakistan, Australia, New Zealand and Canada could all contribute a brigade or two brigades to create a mobile, central reserve, not committed at any particular task but ready to move at immediate notice to any part of the world. I believe that would reduce our own British manpower commitment and bring the day of the end of National Service nearer. It is something we should bear very much in mind, and I hope my right hon. Friends will take note of it.
I also feel that today there should definitely be two types of division in the British Army. We should have the type of division, perhaps heavily armoured and heavily armed, such as we have in N.A.T.O., but our other divisions should be very much smaller in size and manpower, more lightly equipped, and the essential point is that they should be able to move. Our defence today is terribly rigid. It is difficult to avoid that because we have so many commitments and such a large proportion of our available troops are tied down to various places and various tasks. Until we can somehow get away from that and make our defence forces—British and Commonwealth—more flexible and more mobile, we shall never be able really to exert the strength in world defence that we ought to be exerting today.
I finish with the point on which I started. I am sure we would all like to do away with National Service. From every point of view I think it is unfortunate, inefficient and a waste of money and of manpower, but I cannot see at the moment that it can be done away with. I am quite certain that it cannot be done by an arbitrary date. The right hon. Member for Belper (Mr. G. Brown), in what I thought a most excellent opening speech, took the other line and wanted to do away with it because he said that would be a good thing to do. I admit that it would be a good thing to do, but I think we have to put the horse before the cart—not say


that we will do away with it and then see how it works, but examine it from the opposite point of view.

7.24 p.m.

Mr. Clement Davies: It is always a pleasure to listen to the hon. and gallant Member for Norwood (Sir J. Smyth). He always puts his case so fairly and reasonably that he carries hon. Members on all sides of the House largely with him.
I shall be very short in my speech this evening for the reason that I find myself in such complete agreement with what was said by the right hon. Member for Easington (Mr. Shinwell). His approach to this matter is exactly the approach which, with far less knowledge and experience, I have made. I want very shortly to express my personal view on what I consider may happen.
First, like the right hon. Member, I say that the most precious possessions we have are our mode of life, our independence and our liberty. Everything needed for the defence of those possessions must be done, cost what it may. That has always been my view, which I have expressed in this House now for nearly a quarter of a century when any question of defence has arisen. The question is whether today we are using the very best methods for our defence. It is to that point that I shall address myself this evening.
Let us consider what is the position today compared with that of a few years ago. When I listened to the Minister of Labour it seemed as if there had been no change whatever in the situation, certainly during the last five years. The amount of money which had to be spent was much the same, and the number of people who had to be in the Army was much the same; in fact, there was not much change at all. Compare that with what we heard on Monday of last week from the Prime Minister. The Prime Minister came to the House and solemnly assured us, with all the experience and information he has, and immediately following the Conference of Commonwealth Prime Ministers, that in his view the danger of global war has now gone. He said, "I am sorry I cannot say it has gone forever, but certainly it has gone for the present." [Interruption.] If the hon. Member for Harrow, East (Mr. Ian

Harvey) wishes to refer to that, I have the statement here, and that, shortly, is what it means. If that is so, we have to re-examine the whole position.
When the war was over many countries demobilised, perhaps demobilised too quickly. We certainly came down from about 5 million to about 650,000 or 680,000 men. America came down to about 1 million and Russia stopped at about 4½ million. I could never make out why in those early years it was necessary to retain National Service. The answer then given by the Secretary of State for War and the Minister of Defence was that it was necessary to provide reserves. That was the only reason why it was kept on. It was admitted by everyone at the time that conscription is contrary to the whole attitude of this country in defence of itself. It is something to which the country strongly objects at all times except when there is actual war. When war is on, not only is it necessary, but it is the best method at that moment for dealing with the situation. When war is over, most of us condemn that system. As all Members have said, it is wasteful, unsatisfactory and a bad use of manpower, not only of the men themselves but of the Regulars.
We went on like that until the Berlin airlift, and thereupon undoubtedly there was a different attitude in this House and in the country to the whole matter. There was a realisation that we were not out of danger yet, but the total amount of our defence programme was only somewhere between £700 million and £800 million.
It is impossible to discuss our defence problems while limiting the discussion to manpower alone. That is sheer nonsense, it is equally wrong to limit the debate to the Army alone or the Navy or the Air Force alone. We are anxious about what our defence is and whether we are having the best and most efficient defence possible.
Before I proceed with the history, as it seems to me, I would point out that the figure of £1,500 million does not represent the full cost of defence to the country. We are removing from normal production in the country between 700,000 and 800,000 young people who would be adding to the ordinary production of the country—an addition which is very much needed. We are also using about three times their number in production in order


to provide for them. In addition, we have to bear in mind the materials which are required. All that is taking resources from the ordinary needs of the country for itself or its production, and the figure of £1,500 million is only a part of the tremendous cost which we undertake.
Returning to the history, we then proceeded with N.A.T.O. It was absolutely essential that the free countries of the world should come together and assist one another as best they could in the defence of the one common thing which matters to us all, our own independence and freedom. Without doubt the formation of N.A.T.O. has saved us. No single country was strong enough to stand alone—not even the United States. Very rightly, therefore, we decided to come together.
Unfortunately, we seem to have left it there. We do not know what plan was made in the first instance, but we know what it was at Lisbon in 1952. We know what was stated to be necessary for the safety of us all to deal with the main danger, which was in Europe, and it was 30 divisions. Those have not appeared. We, on the other hand, have carried out our undertaking and have put four divisions in Germany. As has been pointed out, France, through no fault of her own but because of the situation, has been unable to carry out her promises. N.A.T.O. has not worked as we thought it would work and is not working today as we expected.
In the meantime, these tremendous costs have continued until in the last five years we have been spending roughly one-third of our Budget income on defence. Is that necessary today? That is what we want to know. I approach the question by asking, first, what is necessary? We are different even from those who are our allies in N.A.T.O. for we, more than any of them, even France, have obligations outside Europe. Most of the others have their obligations confined within their own continent. We have our international obligations in conjunction with all the other free nations.
That being so, we ought to work together, to pull together, to plan together and to share together. Is that being done today? We all know that it is not. We do not even do research together, we do not even tell one another what is the

result of our research. Each one of us goes about our business independently as if all were well. Apart from not giving us the strength which we should have, it is extremely wasteful. Surely it could be ended.
If the Prime Minister is right in saying that global war no longer threatens us, has not that made a difference? If we read the Amendment we see that even the Government recognise that it has made a difference and that the whole of our strategy must now be reconsidered. Is it necessary today to have a Navy in its present form? I know the affection which we have for the Navy and how much we have depended upon it in the past, but the battleship has been out of date for a considerable time and we must ask, "What about the other ships?"
What is the position now that we have guided missiles? Is it necessary that we should continue to spend the vast sums which we are spending now upon Bomber Command, when apparently America is concentrating upon the guided missile? If one is right, why should the other continue along this line, when we are all out to help one another in common defence?
What is the position with the Army? Is has been recognised time and again that the present way in which we are calling up these young men is the most wasteful way. If global war has disappeared, has not a change come about in the whole of our strategy, or are we still in the same position as when we first formed N.A.T.O.? If there has been a change, it is the duty of the fifteen Governments which form N.A.T.O. to come together and see what is needed. If that is done, can it be said that there will be no saving whatever in material, manpower, and expenditure on research in the various services which we have to use in the Navy, the Air Force or the Army?
That is the way in which I look upon our general obligations. I agree with the hon. and gallant Member for Norwood and the right hon. Member for Easington: why should the fifteen of us bear the tremendous burden of protecting the freedom of the world? Where are the others? Why should we, all the time, make this great sacrifice? Why should not the others be called in, not only the Commonwealth but other nations who owe their very freedom to the sacrifices


which this old country has made? Is it fair that we should continue to carry this burden when we face such tremendous economic problems?
Conventional weapons are, of course, still needed, but it seems to me that they are not needed because of considerations of a global war. Apparently we have reached the position when, if there is a global war, somebody will start to use these terrible bombs and there will then be retaliation by those of us who possess these weapons, like Samson pulling the whole thing down and saying, "If we have to go, let us all go together".
There will, in addition, be small troubles—small compared with the global war—such as we face today. What is needed for those? I should have thought that what we needed was the most efficient small Army, small Air Force and small Navy possible, all of them reaching the greatest height of efficiency and capable of being moved quickly to the scene of the trouble, being so efficient that they would stop the wrong-doer because, knowing full well that they could be used so quickly, he would not dare to move. What was needed for such a purpose, I should have thought, was not men called up for service for a short period. I agree with the hon. Member for Dudley (Mr. Wigg) that we should look not only at the number of men but at the length of training. I should have thought what was needed was an Army of the highest technicians we could possibly find. They are making this their career. Why should not they be treated better than any of us, because they are prepared, not only to do their duty, but possibly to offer their lives as a sacrifice. That is what I mean by carrying a small, efficient force in all three Services in order to deal with a situation such as that.
That being so, can it be said that the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Easington and I are wrong in saying that we cannot save, when we consider all these matters together, a mere matter of

6 per cent. of the national income or that that would bring us down roughly to the kind of expense which we were needing when the threat happened with regard to Korea? Up till that very moment, the amount that we were spending—and we thought that it was quite enough—was about £780 million. We could call that in today's terms, because of the fall in the value of the pound, £1,000 million. Today, we are spending £1,500 million without the others coming in and doing their share.
I should have thought that the right thing to do, and it ought to have been done in 1952, when the plan was seen not to be working, was to call the others together, take our own plan, and discuss it with them. In that way, I should have thought that there would have been the most efficient defence and at the same time a saving of money to this country which is so heavily taxed. I think, as the Prime Minister said, that the global military war has now passed away, but I am perfectly sure that there is an economic war starting and that we must be ready for it. That is one way in which we shall need all our men and resources.

Mr. John Hall: There is one point which we have been waiting with some anxiety to hear. I understand that it is the policy of the party of which the right hon. and learned Gentleman is so distinguished a Leader to reduce defence expenditure by about £500 million. I assume that that is not an airy-fairy figure but that it is based on sums. Can we have the sums?

Mr. Davies: I said that I agreed with the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Easington. Surely it is there in that form. One can go through the various items of expenditure on the Army, Navy and Air Force and make various cuts in them. What we want to do is to make up our minds on what is needed and discuss that with our Allies. Then I am perfectly certain that the cut which I have mentioned could be made.

Orders of the Day — BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE

The Lord Privy Seal (Mr. R. A. Butler): May I be allowed, Mr. Speaker, to make a statement?
Since I announced, earlier today, the arrangements for tomorrow's debate on the Third Reading of the Consolidated Fund (Appropriation) Bill, Mr. Dulles, the United States Secretary of State, has arranged to come to London for talks tomorrow.
In view of the fact that my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister and my right hon. and learned Friend the Foreign Secretary will wish to be free to take part in these talks, it is now proposed, with the agreement of the Opposition, that the debate on Suez should be deferred until Thursday.
Questions on that day will, therefore, begin at 11 a.m., and it is proposed that the debate on Suez should follow and continue until 5 o'clock. The usual debates on the Adjournment, already arranged by Mr. Speaker, will start immediately afterwards, and will continue until 10 o'clock.
The debates on the Third Reading of the Consolidated Fund (Appropriation) Bill tomorrow will be on the administration of the Seychelles and the position of Seretse Khama.

Mr. Clement Davies: Naturally, it is right, Mr. Speaker, that the debate on Suez should not take place tomorrow, but is it right that such an important matter should be taken on the last day in this way, merely from 12 o'clock to 5 o'clock? Surely the House will be willing to sit on Friday and allow that day to be used for debating various subjects on the Adjournment.

Mr. Speaker: I am afraid that the intervention of the right hon. and learned Member for Montgomery (Mr. C. Davies) was irregular. The intervention of the Leader of the House to make his business statement was remotely relevant to the subject that we are discussing, defence. But if this argument about business goes on, I fear that even my sense of what is relevant will be too much stretched. We ought to get on with the debate.

Mr. Shinwell: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. May we know when the Motion

for the Adjournment will be moved? Will that be on Thursday night, or on Friday? Will it come on at 10 o'clock? That is, not the Adjournment of the House, but the Adjournment Motion for the Recess. When will that be moved?

Mr. Speaker: I imagine that will be tomorrow. It is usually the day before we adjourn that the Adjournment Motion for the Recess is moved, that is, the Motion, "That at its rising Tomorrow the House shall adjourn"—until such and such a date. That is tomorrow.

Mr. Shinwell: In that event, will it be permissible tomorrow to debate whether we adjourn on Thursday night or on Friday?

Mr. Speaker: Certainly.

Orders of the Day — DEFENCE AND MANPOWER

7.47 p.m.

Sir James Hutchison: It is rare to find this Chamber so full, even before the appearance of my right hon. Friend the Leader of the House to make his statement, which shows, of course, the great interest and importance of the subject which we have been discussing.
The right hon. and learned Gentleman the Member for Montgomery (Mr. C. Davies) applauded the speech of the right hon. Member for Easington (Mr. Shin-well) and said that he found himself almost in entire agreement with it. It is to one particular point made by the right hon. Member for Easington that I should like to refer. We have to think much more deeply than we have hitherto in connection with the whole of the manpower of the Army and about the use of ground forces. The right hon. Gentleman thought that there was a considerable possibility of economy in a re-appraisal of strategy in connection with the ground forces which we have at present. Before I pass on to the rest of my remarks, I want to refer to the speech of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Belper (Mr. G. Brown), because, in an otherwise plausible and persuasive speech, he introduced what I thought was an appalling fallacy, in that he stated, and I took down his words, "We must start at the outset to do away with National Service and then do the sums afterwards."
That is an attractive and fascinating way sometimes of conducting one's life, but it may be very illusory when one applies it to one's bank account. I would remind him of Mr. Micawber's dictum that sums are in fact unfortunately always desperately important. It would be, as my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Norwood (Sir J. Smyth) said, putting the cart before the horse to go over to N.A.T.O. with a decision made, though I agree that the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Belper was, I think, prepared to amend that decision in the light of discussion with N.A.T.O.

Mr. G. Brown: Do not let us misrepresent this. The Motion does not talk about going over with a decision. The Motion says: formulate a plan, take the plan for consultation, and then make a final plan in the light of that consultation. That is clear in the Motion, and it was clear in my speech. I hope that the hon. Gentleman will accept it that there is a difference between formulating a plan and making a final decision.

Sir J. Hutchison: I did not mean to say that it was a final decision, but surely in making a plan one must start off by seeing what the plan will cost one in men and money. It may be that we mean the same thing, in which case I agree that the right hon. Gentleman's suggestion is more feasible than in the way in which he presented it to the House, as I understood it.
The picture that we have had painted today is a picture of a nation living beyond its means, groping to find some economies and looking over its political shoulder while doing so, because, of course, National Service is unpopular. Any party that can either reduce or abolish it will certainly not be unpopular, but the defence of the country must be decided on graver considerations than that by itself. One thing that is certain out of our discussions, and I think is admitted on both sides of the House, is that statistically it would be impossible to face our present commitments, carried out in the present way, if the Opposition Motion were carried through. Whether it be 130,000 or 150,000 men in 1961 is really not material. I think that it is generally admitted that they could not carry out the heavy commitments which we are shouldering at present.
Where, then, are we going to make some change in these commitments? What will happen after we have politically fought and defeated Nasser's latest move is another matter. Perhaps the climate will change but, as we are today, the removal of any of the troops we have anywhere in the world is an invitation to another incident. We are living in a period of developing nationalism among all sorts of small people who have never thought of it before. That nationalism is fomented by Russia because she believes that the more trouble and disturbance that she can create anywhere the more likely will Communism be brought about in those areas.
There is a general belief in the world that this country is physically weak, and weak in determination at the present time. Communists believe that a country bled white in two world wars is easily turned red. The less our flag is seen the less attention will be paid internationally to our views. Does anybody believe that if our troops had been on the Canal we should have had the Suez incident now?

Mr. Emrys Hughes: We should not have had Cyprus.

Sir J. Hutchison: The removal of troops from the Canal is the kind of gesture which, if repeated, will invite other incidents. Nothing is clearer than that. Perhaps this debate will have done one good thing, and the action of the Egyptian dictator will have done a good thing if we are forced to think straight on this point and we realise that moving garrisons out at present risks inviting somebody else to plunder.

Mr. Hughes: The hon. Member has talked about a dictator and defeating Nasser. Does he contemplate war with Egypt?

Sir J. Hutchison: I thought that after thinking it over for a while the hon. Member might believe that he could make something of that, but I spoke of waging a political campaign against Nasser and winning the political war. The hon. Member should not put in my mouth the intention or belief that war need necessarily come about.
Unless some completely new system can be devised of providing garrisons, perhaps by improved airlifts, which in any case would be very expensive, we


shall be piling up trouble for ourselves if we start removing troops from places like Hong Kong in the present world climate. Therefore, if we are to change our commitments we must look elsewhere, and that leads me to what a good many speakers have revealed as having in their minds, namely, that something can be shorn off our commitments under the Paris Agreements.
These involve us in keeping four divisions and a tactical air force on the Continent. It is true that the size of the divisions is not laid down, but I do not believe that any hon. Member would use that avenue of escape to offer a division that could not do its job. I do not believe that that is the intention of any hon. Member. I think that some hon. Members believe that a small and more mobile division could face that task, but I ask them to remember the immense strength, in what are called the conventional forces, of those who are opposite us.
We must remember that four divisions in Germany, whatever their ultimate size, can be used in extremis as mobile reserves if trouble breaks out elsewhere, in the way that the French have used their troops in Algeria. Therefore, they are not valueless in the sense that they are stuck in Germany and not able to act anywhere else. Large numbers of people genuinely hold differing views about whether we should rely on a "tripwire" conception of things and nuclear bombing and virtually do away with ground troops, or at any rate reduce them very materially.
Bombing needs a target, which might be one of three things. It might be a city, it might be lines of communication or it might be concentrated troops. We must bear in mind the old maxim, which has held good throughout generations of warfare, that the primary task is to destroy the enemy. If we bomb lines of communication and supplies, we do that only in order that we may ultimately destroy the enemy. A concentrated accumulation of enemy must be the only worth-while target for nuclear bombing, because the nuclear bomb is so devastating in its extent and so expensive to manufacture that we cannot afford to use an atom or hydrogen bomb where there is not a concentration of troops.
Now the only thing that can force a concentration of troops is other ground troops. As General Gruenther said in a speech last year,
We must still have ground troops to stop enemy onslaughts on the ground.
He meant, and he elaborated it later, that if we do not have ground troops to force the enemy to concentrate he can advance across a continent in widely dispersed formations. What is our answer then? Western Europe would be overrun, with all tactical points held, not necessarily strongly but held because there would be no ground troops to force a strong holding. What would we do then? Bomb Moscow and Leningrad, or bomb Bonn and Paris which would have few Russian troops in them but would be seething with our Allies? It is an agonising choice.
For example, what would hon. Members do if suddenly tomorrow an East German division walked across to West Germany and sat there? What a desperate choice would confront us. The only choice left to us, without a measure of ground troops, would be to drop a nuclear bomb in that comparatively trivial incident, or else leave the East German troops there. We are therefore forced back on the conclusion that we should be asking for trouble. As General Is may said in his five-year review of N.A.T.O.,
Any strategic plan must include the territory of Western Germany.
And Dr. Adenauer said the other day that by removing our ground troops completely or in large measure we should be increasing the risk of a third world war.
That is why Dr. Adenauer is so anxious himself to supply the twelve divisions which Western Germany has promised. His Defence Minister has recommended a period of conscription of eighteen months. His generals have, in fact, in view of the complexity of modern weapons and of their training, asked for a period of two years. We have to decide this before we make up our minds that we are going to reduce the number of ground troops which, as I have contended, are overwhelmingly outnumbered by the ground troops of our potential enemy: Are we prepared to use a bomb for any incident, and are we prepared, in return, to be bombed over here? After all, we are a very vulnerable island.
I agree it is essential that there should be, along with N.A.T.O., a reappraisal of the outlook, but I hope that those who go to a meeting with the other N.A.T.O. countries will not go with their minds made up on any particular form of strategy in the way that I have thought was indicated this afternoon. I was glad to hear that it is the policy of hon. Gentlemen opposite, as well as our official policy, not to make a move in the reduction of forces without consultation with our N.A.T.O. friends. We must remember that some of the countries in N.A.T.O. are very close to the enemy. They take a different attitude and have a different outlook about the possibility of the enemy being stopped at the frontier of Western Germany to what we might take back here.
That is why General Gruenther has said that we must have a forward strategy. We must have our radar system, our early warning system, pushed as far forward as possible. Incidentally, if we have our airfields pushed far forward, how can we defend those without having ground troops? So let us have a re-appraisal of the whole situation, but let us carry our N.A.T.O. Allies with us, otherwise we might risk splitting N.A.T.O., which is the cornerstone of the defence of the West. It is true that the risk of a global war has been reduced, but it has been reduced largely because we, along with the United States of America, and considering all the weapons at our disposal, have been somewhere near parity. If we now proceed to reduce that nearness to parity, if we show ourselves by withdrawal to be much weaker than we have been hitherto, then once again I consider that we are increasing the risks of an incident which could easily lead to a Third World War.
So let us examine our efficiency. Let us continue to press for disarmament. In time, if we keep up our pressure, that will come. In the meantime we must not lower our guard, for we are going through a test just now between democracy and dictatorship, and dictatorships and tyrannies never last. If Nasser has had his eyes fixed on the Hitler technique, as seems to be the case, he might also remember the end of Hitler, Mussolini

and Peron. Because, as I have said, tyrannies never last. There is evidence of that in the breakdown and the weakening of the Russian grip over her people, in the incident at Posnan, and in the recent liberation that has been going on inside Russia. For the human spirit demands something more out of life than tyranny will allow it to have.

8.4 p.m.

Mr. George Wigg: I wish this debate could have been held yesterday, for it would have been more appropriate to say what I now want to say. One hundred years ago yesterday was born Richard Burdon Haldane, afterwards Viscount Haldane of Cloan, who was, I think, the greatest Secretary of State for War this country has ever had.

Sir J. Hutchison: So did Haig.

Mr. Wigg: If the hon. and gallant Gentleman had paid me the honour of reading the Motion I put on the Order Paper, drawing attention to the centenary of Viscount Haldane's birth, maybe the Government would have done something about it instead of ignoring it.
[That this House will, at an early date, resolve itself into a Committee to consider an humble address to Her Majesty praying that Her Majesty will give direction that a Monument be erected at the public charge to the memory of the late Right honourable the Viscount Haldane of Cloan, K.T., O.M., the centenary of whose birth occurs on 30th July, 1956, bearing as an inscription certain words, used by the late Field Marshal Earl Haig, which indicated that Viscount Haldane of Cloan was the greatest Secretary of State for War that England had ever had, and expressed grateful remembrance of his successful efforts in organising the Military Forces for a war on the Continent, notwithstanding much opposition from the Army Council and the half-hearted support of his Parliamentary friends.]
I want to do two things in mentioning the centenary of Lord Haldane's birth. One is to pay tribute to his memory. I regret very much that the Government have not marked the centenary in some appropriate way. But there is a great significance that I attach to Haldane. I wish that every hon. Member of this House would try to understand, or even begin to understand, what Lord Haldane tried to do fifty years ago, and succeeded


in doing. First, be it noted, he himself said:
I knew but little of military affairs and of Army Organisation I was wholly ignorant.
He went on to say that this was a virgin field in which he could operate by applying first principles, and he did it very well, although he had no backing from the Liberal Party of the time because that party, like many of my hon. Friends, said "Do not attempt any great improvements, the attempt will fail. Concentrate yourself on reducing Estimates." Lord Haldane said:
My reply was that economy and efficiency were not incompatible, that I believed we could obtain a finely organised Army for less money than at present, but a finer Army we must have, even though it cost more.
Given the political situation and time in which he found himself—and be it remembered that in 1906 there was not a single brigade in this country which could be committed to underwrite our political obligations on the Continent—in the course of eight years he organised an Expeditionary Force of six great divisions, fully equipped, including one cavalry division. He did it in such a way that mobilisation took place and fifteen days afterwards, those divisions were committed in the field. He did it, he said, because he recognised after he had examined the problem that it was not a problem for the General Staff but for the Adjutant-General. It shows that Haldane understood the importance of organisation and administration.
If one studies Lord Haldane's work, one finds that, encouraged by the Sovereign and despite some opposition from the popular Press, he went to Germany and there studied the work of the great German General Staff. What he found was that the great von Moltke insisted that the two arms of the Service, the General Staff and the administrative side, should not be housed in the same building but separated by at least a mile. Indeed, said von Moltke, one mile was not enough; they must be kept absolutely apart.
Mr. Deputy-Speaker, you may wonder why I emphasise this point, but today we are discussing a problem of the organisation of manpower. What do hon. Gentlemen do when they find themselves in difficulties? They enter into sweeping generalities, and before they know where

they are, they are discussing missiles, atom bombs, divisions and heaven knows what. This is just the thing that Lord Haldane warned against.
Of course, the generality of these things must be decided in a democracy by an elected assembly. Policy must be debated, but when the House of Commons has had its debates upon foreign affairs, when by a decision of the House problems have been settled, they have to be taken away and translated into organisation terms. But what the House of Commons is doing, and almost every hon. Member is doing today—if I may say so without impertinence, for at the moment, like little Jimmy, I feel that I am the only person in step; is the equivalent of cheating at patience. In the long run, who has one cheated? Surely the only person cheated is oneself. We can play around with strength and recruiting figures until the cows come home, but what will decide the position in the long run? Will the arithmetical gymnastics of my right hon. Friend the Member for Belper (Mr. G. Brown) decide the question? Not at all. Or the verbal obscurities of my right hon. Friend the Member for Dundee, West (Mr. Strachey)? Surely not.
What will be decided will be decided by the number of young men who signify to their commanding officers their willingness to stay in the Army or the number of young men who will sign on the dotted line and enlist into the Forces for a number of years. One can twiddle round with the facts as much as one likes, but ultimately one comes face to face with that simple fact.
I very much regret that the debate has taken place in the shadow of what is happening in Suez. Over the last ten years we have had a variety of alibis. It was said, "We cannot do anything about National Service while the Korean war is going on". The Korean was ended, and there were impassioned speeches by my right hon. Friend the Member for Dundee, West, and he said the answer was "There is nothing we can do about National Service until we have solved the problem of the Middle East." When we have evacuated the Middle East, it is said "We must go forward with a plan."
That is what was being said four years ago. Four years ago we realised—at least some of us did—that National Service was a problem which would


break the back of the national economy and it would not give us the defence we needed. The Opposition then did not say that we could abolish National Service but we did say that every policy decision connected with defence should bear in mind the necessity of getting rid of National Service at the earliest possible opportunity.
Nobody did anything until very recently. Now the Labour Party decides that it can all be done by 1958. I do not believe it, and I shall not vote for the Motion tonight. There are not enough horses in the world to drive me into the Division Lobby for the Motion, for the very simple reason that I know that it cannot be done. I know very well that if a Labour Government is elected at the next General Election it cannot do it either.
There is one thing that I take rather hard. My right hon. Friend this afternoon came a little near to charging me with wanting to keep National Service. That aroused me a bit, for I come from a family of Regular soldiers and today I have a couple of nephews who I have persuaded to join the Regular Army—perhaps I am the only hon. Member who has members of his family who are n.c.o.s in the Regular Army.
I have been a Regular soldier, and therefore, I know, perhaps better than many other hon. Members, what a difference National Service makes to the Army and what it is like to be a Regular soldier. I am not saying any more about it than that, but I want to get rid of National Service because I want a good Regular Army. I have done my best to achieve this ever since I became a Member of Parliament. I make no claim to being a great strategist or anything of that kind. I have "cooked" more pay and mess books, I have "fiddled" more Army returns, and I have peeled more potatoes than any other hon. Member. That is the only claim that I make.
I want to get rid of National Service, and have always wanted to do so, for the one reason that I have given. I have given as one reason my personal connection with the Regular Army. It may be regarded as an emotional reason. However, I hope I shall not be charged, even by implication, with wanting to keep National Service, for if that is done I shall react sharply. I want to get rid of

National Service, and I am quarrelling with those who now advocate policies which in the long run will prevent the abolition of National Service. What is the real trouble?
We have not yet had an effective diagnosis of what has gone wrong. It is something very simple. It can be expressed in the simplest terms. My mathematics do not go beyond the twelve times table and simple addition. Let us say that before the war one got 25,000 young men to undertake Regular engagements. Let it be noted that it was always an engagement of twelve years, partly with the colours and partly with the Reserves. Flexibility was secured by varying the periods of colour and reserve service according to the branch of the Army. For example, in the infantry it was seven years with the colours and five in the reserve; in the Guards, in which large numbers of reserves were required, three and nine; in the Artillery six and six; in the Royal Armoured Corps six and six; and so on.
Obviously, the size of the Army that can be obtained will be the number of men that can be enlisted multiplied by the number of years for which they enlist. That is the simple proposition. I am not going to enter into old controversies. I have said what I have had to say about the Secretary of State for War. What I have had to say about him was true. The man who introduced the three-year engagement introduced a new multiplier, so that if we recruited as many recruits as we did before the war and multiplied the number by three, the length of the new three-year engagement, we should have an Army half the pre-war size. This will continue unless, by hook or by crook, we can at least change the multiplier back from three to six. There is nothing complicated about that unless for reasons of one's own one wants to make it complicated. The great problem is to get back from the three-year engagement to at least the six-year engagement.
There was a time in this House—I read the speeches and the interjections with a certain amount of acid interest—in 1953 when it looked to the innocent as if the three-year engagement would be successful. One of my right hon. Friends claimed the credit for introducing the engagement. However, it has not worked out like that. If any hon.


Members wish to refresh their memory let them read HANSARD—I do so whenever I am depressed—for the evenings of 26th and 27th January, 1953.
It was then thought that the three-year engagement would be a success. As for me, it was "exaggeration", "hyperbole". All I said was "Do not count your chickens before they are hatched." I said that the test was not the number of young men who took the three-year engagement but the number of young men who stayed on at the end of three years. I happened to have an idea of what the number would be, because I used to fiddle with Army returns and statistics when I was a young sergeant. I happened to remember what the rates of extention were. When I heard the Secretary of State say, with the approval of some of the military experts in the House, that it would be possible to get 33 per cent. of the young men on three-year engagements to stay on, I knew they were barmy, and that was being charitable, because if they were not being barmy, they knew the truth and were not speaking it.
I suggested that the rate would be 10 per cent. It has turned out to be 5·1 per cent. There is the measure of the problem. In every Army Estimates debate I have kept on on my own, boring lots of people, but it has generally been in the early hours of the morning when there has been nobody except myself and the occupant of the Chair. I have been called "misinformed", "misanthropic", and all the names that those who have been to the great public schools can dish out for any whom they regard as their social inferiors. They said that it would all come right in the end and that I was completely and utterly wrong. I did not mind what they called me for I have no political ambitions. I passed all that when I became Parliamentary Private Secretary to my right hon. Friend the Member for Easington. I have no more ambitions now. Like my right hon. Friend, I have mellowed with age. I can afford to say that I do not mind what names I am called. Year after year in debates on National Service in the Army Estimates I said much the same thing.
"One year from now the Army will be weaker than it is today. Day by day, week by week, month by month, year

by year, the Army will become weaker." And so it has proved. It is not much fun reminding people of what one said, but I think that it is necessary to educate people outside the House in order to get some common-sense action. In June, 1955—that is a year ago—I ventured to say that one year from then we should be weaker than we then were. I said it again on the last Army Estimates and whenever I get the chance to catch your eye, Mr. Deputy-Speaker, I come back to the same theme. I said that the figures would show what, indeed, they have shown. I also said—and because I do not want to be misunderstood, I shall quote:
I do not know the way back. … Once one has reached this position, it may be 20 years before one can get back. That is why I say that we have two years' National Service now and will have it for a very long time."—[OFFICIAL REPORT. 13th June, 1955; Vol. 542, c. 306.]
I am one of the minor prophets. I venture to repeat that unless both sides of the House are very wise, we shall have National Service for twenty years or more.
I want to draw attention not only to the consequences of the three-year engagement and the position we have now reached, but to another and much more serious point. After all, if the weakness finds expression only in speeches in the House of Commons, then that is that, but for a long time we have used National Service in this country rather like the French used the Maginot Line. It gave them an illusion of security. The French would not spend enough money to continue the Line either to north or south. Speeches about defence were made and France spent vast sums of money and then one day there came a Panzer division, which was not in their speeches, and that was the end of the Maginot Line. [Laughter.]
Hon. Members laugh. We are to have a debate on Suez. I do not expect that I shall be called—[HON. MEMBERS: "Oh."]—but let me say one or two things about Suez, one or two things on which hon. Members might like to ponder, particularly when they cheer the Prime Minister about taking strong action. When the Prime Minister stood at the Dispatch Box yesterday and enunciated the principle, which has my wholehearted support, that this international waterway


must never remain in the hands of one Power, he carried me with him, but I felt an overwhelming desire to go out and be sick when I heard the cheers on both sides of the House when he hinted at strong action.
Strong action, forsooth! Do hon. Members know, have they taken the trouble to find out, what air power has been available to Britain in the Middle East since the early part of the year? In the last National Service debate I said without contradiction that the test of our power in the world was the number of swept-wing fighters which we had, and at that time we were behind Sweden. There is not a single squadron of swept-wing fighters in the Middle East. I shall not convenience Colonel Nasser or anybody else by giving the locations of other squadrons and I am not saying that what we have there could not take on Colonel Nasser's MiGs.
But the reason they could be taken on successfully does not spring from the wisdom of the House of Commons, nor the courage of the Government. Hon. Members should not pat themselves on the back. They will be taken on as the Old Contemptibles at Mons took on the Germans, the way we have so often fought wars in the past—by the courage, valour and efficiency of the young fighter pilots in the Royal Air Force. That is not good enough, and I will never be a party to it. Before hon. Members cheer the Prime Minister, they should be ashamed at the paucity of the power which this great country exercises as a result of the gross mismanagement of not only the Government, but the House of Commons itself. There has hardly been a realistic defence debate in the House in the last ten years. Hon Members come here and patter sweet generalities. We become airborne and talk space fiction and do everything except face the facts, because we have not the guts to face the consequences that spring from them.
Those are hard words, but I believe that the country is in a very tough position. Let me go a little further. Let us take the position of the Army. Colonel Nasser has an intelligence service. I have in my hand an admirable document. It is "The Household Brigade Magazine", which, in its latest issue, gives an account of the 2nd Battalion Grenadier Guards,

which is a proud regiment, with a great tradition. The magazine said:
With the arrival of new drafts in December and January, the strength of the Battalion has been raised from very low figures of the summer to over 550.
If a crack battalion, stationed at Port Said, in a key position, has its strength raised to 550 from low figures, what was the strength last summer? Referring to the drafts, the magazine goes on:
Some of these, however, have not been through the Training Battalion, and so a local Pirbright course has been arranged at E1 Ballah under the direction of the Senior Major.
Those are the realities of defence. Those are not the nice easy phrases which hon. Members polish up in the morning and come here to retail. Those are the facts which will be tested and paid for by men's lives. That is the test and the House of Commons is answerable for that situation.
Let us turn to the situation as it now faces us and why I reluctantly find myself in opposition to my party. A very admirable document, the second of its kind, has been made available to us in the Vote Office, giving us the prolongations of service and the structure of the Army by length of engagement. It enables any hon. Member who can spare the time to do some sums and to arrive at certain conclusions. If the Under-Secretary of State is taking notes, I wish he would tell the Minister of Defence that he can improve it in two ways. First, he should give the percentage increase for those serving on the short three-year engagement and those serving on the long 22-year engagement. Secondly, he should split up the numbers on the three-year engagement to show those who have opted in and those who have opted out.
Here, I must again be critical of the Government—but I must also indicate the responsibility which rests upon my right hon. Friends in putting the Motion on the Order Paper. What was the Government's policy in the spring? At long last they accepted the simple fact—I will say no more how right I was; it bores even me to keep on saying it—that the three-year engagement was not a Regular engagement. The Minister said it this afternoon. Of course, I have always thought that that was fairly clear, and that it was, in fact, an extended National Service engagement, which


depended upon National Service itself to get men to undertake the three-year engagement.
Hon. Members on this side of the House can help by judging the facts in the light of their own personal experience. The Government are saying to these young men, "You have to do two years' National Service. You can come in and do 18 months at 4s. 6d. a day, and the last six months at 7s. 6d. a day, or you can enter on a three-year engagement at 9s. a day, with no Reserve service to follow." Many young men, given that choice, accept the 9s. a day. But, as I said in an Adjournment debate last week—and as seems so obvious—once the Prime Minister goes north to make his speeches, and the Conservative newspapers begin reporting and believing in what he says, a new factor emerges.
Once doubts are cast upon the continuance of a period of two years' National Service, or even any continuance at all, the problem confronting the young men at once changes. They then have to say to themselves, "Shall I take 9s. a day and do three years which I do not want to do, or stay in civilian life and get £10 or £12 a week?" Can hon. Members wonder why recruiting figures have not improved?
Let us go further. Once the Opposition put a Motion of this sort on the Order Paper, and the Press report that the matter will be taken to a Division tonight, and that the Labour Party holds the view that an abolition scheme can be drawn up in four years, these young men will tell their parents, "Vote Labour next time and I will not have to do any National Service. Two years from now there will be a Labour Government and there will be no more National Service". What effect do hon. Members think that will have? That is why I intervened this afternoon. I am not voting at the end of this debate. My conscience will be clear. Whatever side hon. Members vote upon tonight, to the extent that they have put doubts in the minds of these young men they are responsible for the continuation of National Service—because we cannot get rid of it until we can get sufficient Regulars and also keep them for a sufficiently long time.
Therefore, the poor old non-militarist Opposition have run their head into a

noose, and I have a fairly shrewd idea why they have done so. I know, because I have fought this battle with my colleagues over a period of months. It is all tied up with politics. Many of my right hon. and hon. Friends have convinced themselves that just before the next General Election the Conservative Government will get rid of National Service. There never has been greater tommy rot. As I wrote in the New Statesman and Nation, months ago, and as I have said in this House, the charge against the Government is not that they do not get rid of National Service but that they cannot get rid of it. Of course they would like to get rid of it. We all would, but we must be careful that by saying that we can we prematurely do not make it more difficult to do so.
I am astonished at my right hon. Friend the Member for Easington (Mr. Shinwell), who ought to know better after all this time. His was a first-class parliamentary performance, although not much of what he said was to do with the subject under discussion—but that is what one means when one refers to a good parliamentary performance. It will read all right. My right hon. Friend mentioned not a single word about Reserves. We have a Reserve force of 620,000 young men—many of them volunteers who give up their spare time to keep the T.A. going. Two divisions, the 43rd and the 53rd (Welsh) Divisions are kept at full establishment and are earmarked for N.A.T.O. In what way are the reserve forces organised at present? When these young men have done their National Service and come out, in the first year they do fifteen days' training, but if my right hon. Friends abolish National Service in 1958, they will turn it all off like a tap, and it must affect the organisation of our reserve forces. But that is not all. As a result of—[Interruption]. If my hon. and learned Friend wants to interrupt, let him get up and say so, but not mumble.

Mr. Paget: In what sort of war does my hon. Friend contemplate that we could conceivably use these reserves?

Mr. Wigg: If my hon. and learned Friend had been here at the time, he would know that I was very careful to say that one should separate the General Staff problem from the administrative problem, and my hon. and learned Friend is essentially a General Staff soldier. I am dis-


cussing the administrative problem; I am not discussing the form of war, because it is not relevant.
I am saying that the Government announced that they would earmark two divisions for N.A.T.O., and that no right hon. Gentleman on this side of the House took exception to that. If they did not mean it, and they were looking round for some money to save, why not start on the Reserve forces? Why put this Motion on the Order Paper? Why not put down the truth? In fact, the Opposition are leaving 620,000 men up in the air, and my hon. Friends never even thought about the effect of National Service on the Reserve force until I mentioned the matter a few moments ago.
Again, without objection from this side of the House—indeed the urge came from this side—it was decided that civil defence should be organised on the basis of mobile columns, fed from the reserves. Various centres for training would be set up, again at considerable cost, and with the support of right hon. Gentlemen on this side of the House. Again, there was no dissent from the Labour Party. What happens to Civil Defence in this country? Perhaps my hon. Friends will say it is unnecessary, but if they held that view, why did they not say so? After all, here is some money to save in this field.
But do not let us leave the problem up in the air. As I said when I began, the test of all this is not a test of opinion. It is the test of the quarterly recruiting returns. I put my head out, and I have received some pretty hard knocks in consequence. I attacked the three-year engagement from the time it was introduced. But I have stuck to my figure and given my reason. Now I notice a new factor is introduced—whether facts and figures are pessimistic or not. When the Secretary of State for War was answering questions after the Adjournment debate which I initiated, he was charged with being pessimistic, and I want the House to note the form which his pessimism took. He doubled the rate of prolongation, and gave it as 10 per cent., but the right hon. Gentleman on this side who had charged him with being pessimistic had apparently failed to note that in order to get the figure as favourable as the Government wanted it, he had multiplied it by two.
Again, I asked the right hon. Gentleman—and I am extremely obliged to him—to bring up to date paragraphs 53 and 54 of the Defence White Paper, because, of course, at some point reality will catch up with the estimates of regular recruits and regular strength for 1956–57. Here again, is a simple test. I will give my estimate now of what I think will happen, not about the Army, but about the Air Force. In my Adjournment debate, I did not mention the Air Force, because I had not the time. But in paragraph 53 of the Defence White Paper hon. Members will find that the estimate is 30,000 recruits for the current year. On the basis of the present returns for the first quarter I should like to bet the right hon. Gentleman sixpence, or a little more if he is inclined, that the figure will not exceed 23,000. If we take the total strength of the Royal Air Force at 1st April next on that figure, well, the estimate was 167,800 and if anyone else would like to make another sixpenny bet, I do not think that it will be more than 158,000.
These are only my figures and this is what all the argument in the world will not solve. Here the problem is having the men and machines to do the job at the right time. There is really no argument about this, because in a war, or at the threat of war, it is reality that counts, and debates in this House of Commons are no substitute for fire-power. It is possible to win votes here, but the reckoning may be a little difficult. A year ago I said—I repeat, it now—that I can describe the situation in which the country finds itself, but I do not find it very easy to say what ought to be done. I agree that we could reorganise the Ministry of Defence. I have reached a conclusion which is not new, I arrived at it after studying the works of Haldane to whom I referred in my opening remarks. Having arrived at where we are now, I do not believe that the defences of this country can be put on a firm basis by tackling the job from a party angle. There must be an all-party approach.
I am staggered that my right hon. Friends do not jump at this, particularly after the speech of my right hon. Friend the Member for Belper (Mr. G. Brown), for he has committed the party to an undertaking to produce a scheme to get rid of National Service within four years of starting the job.
I think that the Labour Party will win the next Election a couple of years from now. Then the recruiting situation will not be any better. I am sure of that. The new pay code has not done the trick. Two years from now the Labour Party will have that undertaking as one of their pledges. I warn my hon. Friends that they will be no nearer getting rid of National Service four years after they come into office than they will be when they start. They will be faced with the same problems as confront the right hon. Gentlemen opposite. A problem does not suddenly solve itself because of the advent of a Labour Government.
This is a problem which affects the whole economic welfare and the future of every man, woman and child in these islands. For Pete's sake, do we have to look at it as party politicians? Cannot we, just for once, get away from all this nonsense and realise that the combined wit of the members of both Front Benches must be exercised during the Recess to find a method of saving the political face of those on both sides of the House, and at the same time save the country? After all, that is a job worth doing.

8.44 p.m.

Mr. Douglas L. S. Nairn: I am delighted to be able to follow the hon. Member for Dudley (Mr. Wigg) because he is the only other back bench Member who has been fortunate enough to be called in this debate. I am glad to follow him, not only because he is one of the minor prophets but also because, in the few months during which I have been a Member of this House, I have found that he is a genuine realist. I admit that I started with some prejudice against him, but my admiration for him has gradually grown.
I fear that, even after all we have been through, we are still the most gullible people in the world. The right hon. Member for Bassetlaw (Mr. Bellenger) gave us an absolutely classic example of playing hide-and-seek with reality, and of disguising facts and figures and dressing them up in what the right hon. Gentleman called "oversized suits", so that we could not recognise them.
The most extraordinary thing about this matter is that the greater the reason we have for being suspicious the more often

we appear to be completely confiding and trusting, in spite of the fact that twice within the lifetime of nearly everybody in this House we have suddenly found ourselves at war and unprepared. At least one of those wars might have been prevented and they might both have been curtailed if we had take the elementary precaution of being prepared and had been ready to take action in time.
In 1956, we are slowly drifting back to that disastrously trusting mood of 1936. I do not accuse hon. Members opposite of that, because I do not think it is true of most of them; but there is a tendency in the country, as there was before the war, the slip back into a trusting mood which has no justification in fact. That is probably a combination of our desire for peace and our horror of war, which turns us into a nation of wishful thinkers every now and again. We are always ready to grasp any hand of friendship that is offered, but we are only too ready to close our ears to noises off which, if we paid attention to them, would give us very little reason for assurance.
In 1936, those noises were the growing rumblings from Hitler and Mussolini. There were insistent buzzes from the Communist propaganda machine. Both Hitler and Mussolini are dead, we all know at what cost in blood and sacrifice, but the buzz of the Communist machine still goes on, though the pitch may be slightly different. Added to it there is now the crackle and hiss of the Egyptian fire into which Nasser is pouring his inflammable invective. I agree with the hon. Member for Dudley and the right hon. Member for Easington (Mr. Shinwell) that it is a pity that this particular thing has come at the time of this debate. It makes it a little difficult to face reality and to plan on normal lines.

Mr. Paget: I never quite follow the point of that argument. Does the hon. Gentleman want more troops, in order to give the Egyptians a hiding?

Mr. Nairn: I do not want more troops, but I should like to see troops that were more prepared.
The right hon. and learned Member for Montgomery (Mr. C. Davies) referred to the Prime Minister's statement that the destructive power of nuclear missiles was now so devastating that no country would willingly start a war which might


destroy the aggressor as certainly as the intended victim. The right hon. and learned Gentleman accepted that the nuclear deterrent ruled out the possibility of war, but is that the case? I believe it is, except—and there are two big exceptions—by accident or by miscalculation.
If we and our Allies are weak, the enemy may well underestimate the risk that he is taking. The most likely way for such an accident to happen would be if we allowed our forces to be so weakened that we were unable to take effective action to prevent creeping aggression. Creeping aggression would inevitably grow into galloping aggression, and galloping aggression would never be stopped except by nuclear retaliation. That is where the greatest danger lies.
I think we all agree that, we have to accept certain calculated risks because of the great difficulties, financial and otherwise, that plague this country. Our dilemma today—it is always a dilemma when we cannot do everything—is to decide what risks we can safely take and what risks can on no account be taken. To be in a position to make decisions of that kind we have to appreciate the various situations which might face us, and, having done that, we have to come to some fundamental conclusions.
I believe that if we make the appreciations fairly, and without prejudice, we are bound to come to three main conclusions. The first is this. If an enemy of the West drops a nuclear bomb anywhere at any time in the foreseeable future, retaliation by the United States will be instantaneous and devastating. After the nuclear war is finished, if we need anything at all we shall need conventional forces.
The second conclusion which we shall come to is that a nuclear war is unlikely except by accident. By accident, I mean by miscalculation on the part of a potential enemy of our ability to deal with creeping aggression.
Thirdly, while we can rely on the United States' instant reaction to the dropping of a nuclear bomb, we cannot rely on their immediate assistance to deal with minor outbreaks perhaps in the Middle East or other places of particular British interest.
If these conclusions are correct, even in the broadest outline, I think that the major decisions that we must take become clear. The first decision—and this is not an easy one, because it involves both manpower and National Service, and so is both economically and politically difficult—is that our primary rôle must be to maintain sufficient naval, military and air forces to deal with scattered outbreaks anywhere.
The second decision is that we must be firmly resolved to keep sufficient troops in Germany, both to maintain the morale of our Allies in N.A.T.O. and to ensure that neither the Russians nor any of her satellites dare to take a calculated risk in Europe.
The third decision which I think we are forced to accept by circumstances is that any calculated risk we can take must be in the sphere of nuclear missiles and the means to deliver them. The nuclear deterrent to war already exists. The nuclear reply to galloping aggression exists and very soon we ourselves will have it to some extent. It is only here that I think we can afford to take a calculated risk. To take a risk with other forces, with nothing else to take their place, would be absolute and utter madness.

Mr. Emrys Hughes: It would be a risk.

Mr. Nairn: A risk, but not a calculated risk. The acceptance of this calculated risk does mean that the planning of our forces must be more closely integrated with the planning of the forces of the United States than it has even been before and, just as important, it must be completely integrated with the planning of our sister nation, Canada.
I would not venture to suggest what the strength of the forces should be or how they should be deployed. To do so I would need a great deal of information which is not at my disposal. All I would insist on is that our forces must be very much more mobile than they have been recently, more readily available and more adaptable. Lastly, they must be adequate. We in this House cannot really decide what "adequate" is. They must be adequate to carry the grave responsibilities they have to bear today and the very much graver responsibilities we might at some time have to put upon them.

8.56 p.m.

Mr. John Strachey: I think it says something for the sobriety and reason of this House that in discussing this Motion on this particular day, when, quite obviously, the very grave situation in Suez must be in all our minds, the House has not allowed that situation to overshadow this debate or deflect it from its ordinary course. It has recognised that this is a debate about what is essentially a long-term plan or proposal for the reorganisation, on the basis of voluntary enlistment, of the Armed Forces of the Crown in general and of the Army in particular.
That proposal may be a right one or a wrong one. We have differed on that, and shall differ on it, but it has only a fairly remote and tenuous connection with the emergency which faces us at the moment in the Middle East, although, of course, it has a strong emotive connection with that and I think that hon. Members on both sides, if I may say so, have shown sobriety on that.
The first thing I want to deal with in the debate is the direct question which was put to me by the Minister of Labour about what we meant in the Motion in regard to our N.A.T.O. obligations. I am, frankly, delighted to answer the question of the right hon. Gentleman since he asked it of me, but I should have thought that the Motion itself was clear on that. I should have thought, also, that the opening speech of my right hon. Friend the Member for Belper (Mr. G. Brown) was crystal clear on it. What we mean, if I may repeat it—and I am delighted to repeat it—is that the Government should make up their mind now, should make a plan, or proposal, for dealing with National Service and, in due course, abolishing it, and should take that plan to N.A.T.O. for discussion.
We do not mean the rather extraordinary doctrine which it seemed to me the right hon. Gentleman put forward. There is a real difference here, for I understood him to say he thought it wrong for us to make our proposals and our plan before going to N.A.T.O. at all. I definitely think that that is going too far. I think that we have to make up our minds and then take that decision to N.A.T.O. for discussion. I say "for discussion" advisedly, not simply for information—I agree with the right hon.

Gentleman there—but for genuine discussion by N.A.T.O. in the precise sense that we might well find that we had, in some particular or another, to modify our proposals in the light of that discussion. It would be by no means mere information.
I would go further than that. We should then come back here and, of course, the final decision on what we do must be taken by Her Majesty's Government. I know that the right hon. Gentleman agrees with me there. That is an absolute condition of sovereignty, but that decision should be taken in the light of the discussions we would have had in N.A.T.O. I think that we have said that in our Motion, it has been said in the opening speech, and I have repeated it in this House now and it ought to be perfectly clear. It is true that the right hon. Gentleman was able to quote some extremely confusing and confused statements by various newspapers, but we cannot be held responsible for what various newspapers of various political persuasions thought that someone had said at a party meeting upstairs. We have made our position perfectly clear in that respect.
What do we think should be the character of the plan which the Government should make? We have put forward the suggestion that it should be a four-year plan for ending the call-up. If the plan were made here and now it would mean that the last call-up would be at the end of 1958. My hon. Friend the Member for Dudley (Mr. Wigg) made great play with that date. He said that if, as he and I both hope and believe, at some time between now and 1958, or in 1958, a Labour Government came into power, we should certainly not be able to do it.
Of course, if we came into office in 1958 we certainly should not be able to end the call-up in 1958. No one has suggested that for one moment. Unless very active steps are taken now, not only in respect of consultation with N.A.T.O., which is quite a long process, but also in recruitment, with which my right hon. Friend dealt and about which I shall say more, then it is perfectly true that we could not end the call-up in 1958. What we are suggesting is that in something like a four-year period from the word


"go", when we first start, it might be done.
Let me say that I, for one—and I think I speak for all here—do not lay particular stress on the period of four years. We lay stress on the fact that a decision should be taken and a plan of not an indefinite length—not ten years or twenty years, but a definite plan of a given number of years—should be drawn up. I will argue in a moment that unless we make a definite plan with a definite period we have not the least chance of ending National Service, and we thereby reconcile ourselves to the indefinite continuance of National Service.
I am bound to say that nearly all the speeches of hon. Members opposite and the speech of my hon. Friend the Member for Dudley have led to the conclusion, not that the hon. Members concerned wish to continue National Service—no one has said that—but that they believe that it must be continued indefinitely. That, I am bound to say, is the only conclusion which any impartial hearer can draw from their speeches.
I want to argue, in a little detail, some of these figures, because I think that the figures are important. If it could be shown that it is arithmetically impossible to carry out this proposal, we should have to think again. I want to argue them essentially in terms of the Army. That, I think, is justified because, in the Secretary of State's words, the main justification of National Service is the Army. If, in other words, it can be shown that the Army can get on without National Service, then, a fortiori, the other two Services can get on without National Service. In taking the Army I am taking the worst case from my point of view—the case which has to be shown, but if it can be shown, everything else follows from it.
It has been striking that throughout the debate that there has been very general agreement as to the approximate size which an all-professional, all-volunteer Regular Army would have to be. Some people have pushed it in one direction and some in the other, but, on the whole, almost everybody is agreed that if we could have an all-professional Regular Army, we could manage with one about 180,000 strong at the bottom figure, to 220,000 at the top. That is all ranks,

and I will speak about that question in a moment.
There is little doubt, I believe, that a figure of that traditional size, which is a traditional size of a British Regular Army, would meet our needs and our essential commitments. Of course, it all depends on what those commitments are made to be by policy. One cannot entirely separate this question from policy. If we wish to indulge in an indefinite number of further Cypruses, if we wish to hold down a few hundred terrorists by 18,000 men in many more places in the world, we should want not an Army of 200,000, but of 2 million men.
There are policies which an Army of that size cannot possibly sustain. In the type of policy which we advocate, and which was strongly advocated by my right hon. Friends in the foreign affairs debate, we took the view, broadly speaking, that what are called the overseas fortresses, which I put it to the House are much more like staging posts for air transport of troops—I think that they have their importance for that, and that that is really their importance today—must be held by treaty and by agreement with the populations which surround them and not by an incredibly extravagant force such as is being used in Cyprus today.
Again, on what I can only call a sane policy in this respect, I do not think that there is much doubt that that is the scale of land armed forces which is necessary and that would enable us to meet those obligations in Germany which the House is united in regarding as absolutely indespensible today. The House, on each side, has said, "Of course, we cannot be tied down to the exact figure which we have there now. Technical considerations change, fire power changes ". But again, with that caveat, it is possible that we should have to increase the amount of weapons and armaments and their power which we hold in Germany. We should have to increase very likely the number of highly-trained and highly technical men we have in Germany while, at the same time, reducing the actual number of bodies, the total there, because that is the obvious tendency of military development today.
But granted, with those caveats, that the same adequate force—which undoubtedly fulfils our obligations under the treaty—of four divisions or their


equivalent in fire power, has to be maintained—there, again, I do not think that this has been disputed—I suggest that an Army of the order of the magnitude which I have just defined, if, and only if, it was an all professional and all Regular Army, could fulfil those obligations.
In passing, I would point out the enormous advantage and economy of manpower of fulfilling all those obligations in that way, as compared with the way in which we are fulfilling them today under a mixed system of National Service and Regulars, under what the Secretary of State himself very vividly called in the Army Estimates debate a half-and-half Army. I do not think the right hon. Gentleman will disagree with me, because he has to face the worries and headaches of this, that the half-and-half system which we have today is proving a very inappropriate and extravagent way of meeting our needs. There may be all sorts of difficulties about meeting them in the alternative way, but the present is a most clumsy way of attempting to do it.
We have only to look at the figures. Again, they are not in dispute. We have nearly 400,000 men in the Army and they really sustain a force abroad, meeting our commitments, of only about 150,000, and 250,000 of them are at home, training and being trained for all the hundred and one miscellaneous tasks of the Army, doing all the very necessary things. I am not necessarily saying that there is avoidable waste—there may be—but I am not arguing that at the moment. But they are doing these things which are necessary and fundamental because of the existence of half the Army under National Service conditions, serving for only two years. It is that waste of national manpower resources which seems to me one of the overwhelming reasons for ending, if we possibly can, the National Service system. That is the commitment side of the balance sheet, and I now come to the recruiting side.
It is a curious thing that when we discuss this matter some of us concentrate all our attention on the commitment side while others of us concentrate all our attention on the recruiting side. We get quite heated if anybody suggests that the other side, in which we are not interested, has its importance. Of course, both sides are of equal importance. The

commitment side is, as it were, the expenditure side of the Army account and the recruiting side is its income side. To concentrate on either one or the other is like a man who is trying to run his private finances thinking only of his expenditure and not his income or of his income and not of his expenditure. If he did that, he would not remain solvent very long. We must look equally at both sides of the account.
When we come to the income side, the recruiting side, the simple question is, of course: can we get a sufficient number of recruits for a sufficient number of years' service to meet the bill of a minimum of about 180,000 men? I will come to the immediate prospect ahead of us, but I think that we ought, first, to look at the matter in terms of what has always happened. We cannot look at it purely in terms of the quite abnormal situation when National Service has been in existence.
The fact is that in inter-war periods, even in the pre-1914 periods, we always recruited an Army of that size, and we got a minimum of about 25,000 recruits in a very bad year and up to 34,000 recruits in a good year. I have the exact figures, but I will not weary the House with them; they vary quite a bit.
The post-war years are not really so instructive because they are, as it were, complicated by the fact that National Service was in existence. The later ones are also complicated by the three-year engagement which is, of course, a totally new form of engagement. But there, again, they do not vary so enormously. In 1951, for example, we had 26,000 recruits, and in 1953, 53,000, but the great bulk of them were on this very short period of service.
In fact, for what it is worth, we are at present recruiting at rather more than that rate. I conclude from those figures that it is really impossible to say that in principle and on the long-term—I am not now talking of timing—it is an unreasonable, scandalous proposition to say that we can recruit voluntarily an Army of the size we want.
Pre-war and inter-war conditions were very different from present-day conditions. We stress that very much from this side of the House. There is full employment now. On the other hand, pay and conditions in the Army are very different


from what they were in that period. Everything is very different. If we got rid of National Service and probably got rid of the three-year engagement at the same time, we should be in a new situation. We should be recruiting in new conditions, but with new inducements also, a Regular Army of about the traditional size. It seems to me somewhat fantastic to stigmatise the suggestion and to say that this is an impossible thing to do. Anyhow, if we say that it is impossible we are simply saying that for the rest of time this country must have conscription.
Why is it, then, that a number of hon. Members, the right hon. Gentleman the Minister of Labour and National Service, the right hon. Gentleman the Secretary of State for War, in an Adjournment debate a few days ago—and I dare say that he will repeat the argument this evening—and my hon. Friend the Member for Dudley, all dogmatised extremely on this subject and said that the whole thing was utterly impossible? The reason is that they are very much concerned, and I understand their concern, about the run-out of the three-year engagement men coming on top of the run-out of the National Service men. They feel that in the third year, if we abolish conscription, there will be a danger point where the Regular Army will go down to a low figure. It is on that basis that the Secretary of State for War gave his figures in the Adjournment debate.
The right hon. Gentleman estimated that the figure would go down to 130,000 and said that that was too low for meeting our needs. I am not controverting his arithmetic, but I am making two comments. One is a relatively minor one, but worth making. It has been made already by my right hon. Friend the Member for Belper. The Secretary of State chose for his estimate to use only male other ranks, and that simply reduces his figures by 20,000. It excludes 13,000 officers and, on his own showing, about 7,000 women and about 2,500 boys. In the long term the boys count. They become very valuable soldiers indeed. Therefore, the right hon. Gentleman is excluding at least 20,000 and I cannot see why he is doing that, except that it suits his argument. This is not a point of vast size, but it is one worth making.
The right hon. Gentleman's other point, where the figures are of crucial importance, is that he calculates the 130,000 on the hypothesis, as he put it in the Adjournment debate, that over the next five years he will get 50,000 Regular recruits. At first sight, that seemed as if he is only expecting 10,000 Regular recruits a year.

Mr. Head: Three years.

Mr. Strachey: The right hon. Gentleman said five years.

Mr. Head: I apologise to the right hon. Gentleman for intervening. I have been into these 1958–61 figures. The figure for the strength of the Regular Army estimated in 1961, that is some 130,000, was calculated from the present target of 310,000 in 1958, and therefore includes only three years' recruiting in 1958–61.

Mr. Strachey: In the Adjournment debate the right hon. Gentleman talked about figures from now to 1961, that is, five years, and he said that he is getting 50,000 recruits between now and then. Superficially, that means 10,000 a year. I realise that the figure is not as simple as that, because the right hon. Gentleman has to allow for wastage in his Regulars as well and he has to allow for prolongations for longer service within his Regulars. It is true that it is not an exact figure.
However, the Secretary of State for War is allowing only for Regular long-term recruits, who are certainly between 10,000 and 20,000, and on his figures it looks as though they are nearer to 10,000, anyhow well below 20,000 a year. The Minister can show that on this hypothesis the strength of the Army quite temporarily—it goes up again, of course, after 1961—shows a dip in 1961, not down to 130,000 but down to 150,000.
What is the value of the hypothesis that the right hon. Gentleman will get long-term Regular recruits of only that order of magnitude? We need not quarrel about the exact figure. A figure of that order is far less, is markedly much less, than was ever obtained in the inter-war or pre-1914 period, and it is far less than the number being recruited at the moment. Here and now they are far more numerous than that. They are being recruited on a very short engagement and National Service is in existence.
I think that the right hon. Gentleman and his experts are taking that figure because it represents a prolongation of present trends. I put it to him, under his own arguments, that this is really a worthless argument, because the Minister put it to us so strongly in the debate on the Army Estimates that the thing which is holding down his Regular recruiting today is precisely the existence of National Service.
Therefore, as our hypothesis is a situation in which we have abolished National Service, and in which, presumably, the three-year engagement has gone with it—because I should have thought it most unwise to maintain it after National Service was in existence and I think the right hon. Gentleman indicated that—the present figures really give him very little guide to the numbers he will be able to recruit during these years.
What is left of this extremely dogmatic argument which is put to us that we are simply flying in the face of hard facts and figures. I honestly think that the argument cannot stand in that form. Yet I would readily admit, as did my right hon. Friend, that something remains of his argument. This remains, that if we abolish National Service it is true that the Armed Forces in general, and the Army in particular, go through a very difficult period of reorganisation. I think it may be specially true in 1961 but, whenever we do it, there is a difficult period to go through, and that has to be faced. But, to say that the thing is forever impossible—and that is, in effect, what we have been told this evening—because of that difficulty, ought not to be allowed to influence the decision of the House.
I put it to the Minister this way. All his experts now are showing him the difficulties, the troubles, the dangers he would have to face. They would not be fulfilling their duty if they did not do so. They are putting before the right hon. Gentleman the risks he would run if National Service were abolished. The only way the Minister will get those experts to say different things is to take a decision to adopt a phased programme, with a date in it for the abolition of National Service, and then his experts will all be working just as hard to find him the expedients, the ways in which it can be done.
There are a great number of expedients. We are not saying that this can be done if, from the word "go", we do not start very actively indeed and, as my right hon. Friend said, spend money on inducing recruitment in all sorts of ways. For example, there is the expedient of giving large inducements for prolongation. There are the expedients of civilianisation, which the Minister of Labour mentioned. There are dozens of expedients, many of which have been put from this side of the House. I do not know which of them would be successful or which of them would be particularly valuable. However, they will not be seriously brought forward and thought about until the decision has been taken to do it.
If the right hon. Gentleman said this evening that he accepted our general point of view, but thought we were running it rather fine when we said it could be done in four years whereas he felt that he needed five years, I should be willing to accept an argument about the exact number of years coming from him in the light of the fact that he and the Government have all the facts at their disposal. However, the point is not the number of years; it is taking the decision to do it, subject to the N.A.T.O. qualifications—we have made it abundantly clear that it is subject to that—and deciding to do it in a given time.
What is the alternative? All sides of the House have been explicit about the alternative. The alternative is continuance of National Service in its present form for an indefinite period. It is not only that. The Minister of Labour rightly spent a long time showing that the continuance of National Service in its present universal form was impossible especially when we reach the 1960s and the bulge in the birth rate comes along. Having exhausted the expedient now being used by the Government of postponing the age of call-up, we cannot continue our present system of, at any rate on the whole, universal National Service.
Consequently, the alternative to what we are proposing, or some proposal along these lines, is not only the indefinite continuance of National Service but the adoption and the indefinite continuance of some form of selective draft. That is


what the House ought to face. We say that that is a most repugnant expedient. It would have most unfortunate consequences upon national morale and cohesion. Those who oppose the Motion ought to show why they think the expedient of the selective draft, which is the only alternative, and which the Minister of Labour began to discuss in some detail and to show that it was very much in the Government's mind, is a tolerable alternative to what we suggest.

Mr. C. I. Orr-Ewing: Would the right hon. Gentleman bear in mind that more than a quarter of our young men—80,000—are exempted on the ground of medical grade from doing National Service? Also, a further 10 per cent., more than 30,000, are exempted because they are engaged in agriculture, mining or the Merchant Navy. Therefore, why does he object to a slight extension of this principle?

Mr. Strachey: Surely medical exemption is a totally different thing from a selective draft.

Mr. Orr-Ewing: National Service is not universal.

Mr. Strachey: Are we not playing with words when we say that National Service is not universal, because those who are unfit are exempted? There is very little in that. Miners are exempted, and were exempted during the war, and merchant seamen are exempted. What we are saying is that if we go further in the process—I believe the Minister of Labour frankly faced this—we are getting into an arbitrarily selective draft. That seems to us the worst course to which we can be driven.
We put forward this proposal not in a dogmatic spirit, but as a proposal which holds the field for meeting a situation which the Government know perfectly well is coming upon them and about which they have to do something, a situation which it is not easy to face. It is a responsible suggestion, covered by our stipulations about N.A.T.O. and the period in which it can be done. It is a serious proposal for one of the things that must be done in the general reorganisation of the defence forces of this country.
We say that in this highly technical, nuclear age in which quality becomes far more important than quantity, National

Service, which we devised after the war in different conditions and which has its advantages from a social point of view—I would not deny that—becomes a less and less appropriate method of raising the kind of forces which we need. Therefore, sooner or later—and we propose that the process should be begun now—we shall have to come to the alternative process of raising a wholly professional and volunteer force. For that is the force which we think is the only type of force which can do the two things which are necessary, namely, to provide the greatest measure of defence for this country which is practicable and yet not, by laying too great a burden on the back of the economy, break it, and so defeat its own object.

9.32 p.m

The Secretary of State for War (Mr. Antony Head): I should like at the start to apologise to any hon. Members who were speaking when I was absent for rather more time than I should have wished. That was not entirely my fault. The debate has been characterised, possibly due to the late start, by the unusually low proportion of back bench speakers. I hope that I shall not be considered a Quisling if I say that I regret that there were not more. I do not think the fault lies with anybody. It was due to the late start and to the great interest of many hon. Members who have been concerned with the Service Departments.
As has been the case for many hundreds of years, the debate has been concerned with the fundamental problem of free democracies—the conflicting demands of the economy and defence. It has always been a problem for Governments that when the sun comes out on the international scene defence is always subject to reductions and that when stormy weather suddenly appears it is so often found that the reductions made during the sunshine are regretted. Whether it is of manpower, money or material, that is the fundamental problem which the House has been discussing today.
One point with which not a single speaker has disagreed has been that it is important that whatever we may do or decide, before it becomes a firm matter of Government authority we should discuss it with N.A.T.O. Unanimity in the House on that matter is of very great importance indeed, because nothing could be more disastrous than that the feeling should be given by the House that we


would out of self-interest take unilateral action which might have most disastrous and far-reaching consequences.
Apart from the conflict between defence and economy, there has appeared in many speeches the view that it is increasingly important that there should be an adequate balance and share as between those weapons and forms of armament which one might put under the heading of the deterrent and those which one might describe as the conventional weapon. That, within the allocation of resources, is a further problem confronting the Government.
There is a tendency to over-simplify the problem in regard to the deterrent. Many hon. Members who have spoken in debates in this House have said that this is an atomic age and that we should have atomic, streamlined forces armed and geared for the atomic age, and that it is nonsense to think that we should continue to have a considerable expenditure of manpower in an age where weapons are so powerful and will become increasingly so. I think I am right in saying that the right hon. Member for Belper (Mr. G. Brown) stressed his opinion that the power of weapons would result in economy in the use of manpower. It would be so much easier for the Chiefs of Staff, the Service Ministers, the Minister of Defence and the Government if one could be absolutely sure about that.
One can say that, broadly, there are four kinds of war today—the thermonuclear war; the war which is confined to limited atomic weapons; the conventional war of the Korean type, and the cold war of Malaya, Kenya and so forth. In the last few years we have changed to a situation in which a possible thermonuclear war is more and more reaching saturation, so to speak. The power of thermo-nuclear weapons is becoming greater, the Powers possessing it are more evenly matched, and the means of delivery in future will give longer range, greater accuracy and be harder to stop. The effect surely will be to make the thermo-nuclear war more and more one to which we shall have recourse only by mistake or in the most dire circumstances.
In those conditions, what of the limited atomic tactical war? One can imagine a situation in which the United States is within the range of thermo-nuclear ballistic

rockets. People would then be very careful in the use of atomic tactical weapons under circumstances which might lead to a thermo-nuclear war, and one cannot help feeling that it would be rash to exclude a quite large war of the conventional type.
I ask the right hon. Member for Belper whether it would be wise to build our Army entirely round atomic weapons, so that if we were faced with a conventional war that Army would be of little or no use. That is a very real dilemma, and I mention it now because there has been a tendency in the debate, when accusing the Government of a lack of progressiveness, to forget that it is not just a case of being modern and going in for atomic weapons, but that there is a conflict between the need for producing conventional weapons and the need for nuclear weapons.

Mr. Paget: Has not the decision been taken at N.A.T.O., and announced here, that an attack in Europe will be met immediately by an atomic counter-attack? Are not the N.A.T.O. forces in fact equipped and ready to do that very thing?

Mr. Head: I am not talking solely about Europe, or about the present time; I am talking about the possibility of other limited wars, and also about a possible situation in five or ten years' time, and putting the question whether or not such a decision would be so easy if New York could be blown to bits by a thermonuclear rocket. It is entirely speculative, but it would be a rash man who said that the day of the necessity for conventional forces was over. That is the only point that I was attempting to make.
Apart from that, we are in the peculiar position that, in addition to N.A.T.O. commitments, we have world-wide economic strategic and Commonwealth interests, which we are forced to defend with conventional forces. The right hon. Member for Easington (Mr. Shinwell) has often said that our share of defence is disproportionate to that of other N.A.T.O. Powers. These considerations make it extremely difficult to ensure economy of manpower by means of an absolutely up to date force making use solely of nuclear weapons.

Mr. Stokes: May I get this straight? Whatever the right hon. Gentleman may


say about the varying degrees of war, does he agree, as a start, that if there is a major war in Europe it will be a thermo-nuclear war? That at least would give us some idea of his thoughts.

Mr. Head: People who prognosticate in the House of Commons on exactly what form war will take in Europe are, in my opinion, extremely unwise. I would say that I personally could not envisage a total war in Europe in which Europe was overrun in which thermo-nuclear or nuclear weapons were not used. I do not think it is relevant to the point that I have just made.
I agree entirely with hon. Members who have said that economies must be made. The Government accept that, and I believe that there are fields for economy falling within both the deterrent field and the conventional field. I think that, as the future progresses, it will be more and more necessary, as scientists think up new ideas and as atomic and thermo-nuclear weapons become more and more expensive, to increase the pooling and sharing of research, production and development of these weapons among the West. If we are to do this alone and independently, then I believe that by the strain of the effort our technical and financial resources will be overtaxed.
In turn, I believe that in conventional forces we are within sight of reductions. In the field of mobility, there are prospects, with a good Transport Command and an increase in ability to transport those parts which we call the tail. In cutting that tail so that it can be airborne throughout the Commonwealth, I believe there is great scope.
I should like to say something about financial cuts. The right hon. and learned Member for Montgomery (Mr. C. Davies), not in his speech today but in the past, was very specific on the subject of financial cuts in defence. I think he advocated a sum of round about £400 or £500 million. Indeed, many hon. Members have asked why there cannot be larger financial cuts in defence. I mention this because I believe that there is a genuine misunderstanding in the House on the question of defence cuts, and my answer would be that there have been very large defence cuts which have to a large extent been concealed. The reason for that is that

defence expenditure, as the right hon. Member for Dundee, West (Mr. Strachey) knows very well, has inherent within its programme the seeds of growth. If we initiate a programme of defence, it is like planting a lot of bulbs. First, the leaves come and the flowers start to come and the more they bloom the more they cost.
Hon. Gentlemen opposite had a programme of £4,700 million, and when they talk about cuts, they ought to remember that that original programme of £4,700 million expenditure would have been up to the sum of £1,800 million in 1953–54. In the event it was £1,600 million. People have said that defence expenditure goes up and up, when in fact there was a concealed cut of £200 million on the planned programme.
What I am trying to explain to the right hon. Gentleman is that, although nothing very spectacular may appear to happen in this House about reductions in defence expenditure, in fact the result from the point of view of defence itself has been a large cutting back of a programme which, if unchecked, might well have risen today to something like £1,900 million and possibly much more. That is the problem with which we are confronted, and that is why I think that these reductions, certainly financially, are not more spectacular. In addition, there is always within defence expenditure the inflationary tendency of wages, prices, pay increases, things like the German costs, and all the additional very great expenses due to changes which are caused by the scientists and in the projects which come in from the Ministry of Supply.

Mr. Stokes: That is the main thing.

Mr. Head: The right hon. Gentleman is perfectly right, because these projects for research and development, which are vital if we are to keep up to date, come into the Ministry of Supply as very small eggs, but as they start to hatch and grow, they are rather like the cuckoos in the hedge sparrow's nest, and have to elbow out all the other projects in their particular field to make it possible to fit them in financially with the very great developments in production. And that particular aspect of new weapons and their commitments is among our major problems so far as a farsighted reduction of the defence programme is concerned.
I wish now to turn to what was perhaps the most prominent subject of the debate, that of manpower. The right hon. Member for Belper spoke with great dash to the Opposition Motion regarding the abolition of National Service in 1958. My reading of his speech, if I am not maligning him, and I do not wish to misquote him, is that having had a look at the abolition of National Service in 1958, he was like a man on a high diving board—he shut both his eyes, held his nose and jumped in. The right hon. Member for Dundee, West was somewhat similar. He said that we could listen to the experts who would tell us the reasons why we could not do this. But we should say that we would go ahead and do it and then the experts would say, "Now we will show you how you can do it."
I see the force of that argument, but I have made a considerable study of the subject, especially as it concerns the Army, and I found myself much more in agreement with the hon. Member for Dudley (Mr. Wigg). I was sorry that the right hon. Member for Belper spoilt my alliance by saying that I had betrayed him in my remarks. The real crux of this business of National Service surely lies in the fact that in deciding whether or not to adopt a policy in 1958, all we can do is to make the best guess we can. The Government have made the best guess they can of an annual recruitment of 18,000 a year. Before the war we were somewhere around 20,000, and we had a Royal Air Force—which has been neglected in this debate—of only 35,000. They are now in business in a big way against us, and it is quite an optimistic assumption that we shall get 18,000.
It is on that assumption that we come down to the trough of 130,000. I would ask any right hon. Gentleman opposite who is thinking about it, and especially to the right hon. Member for Dundee, West, that if he was faced with a situation within two years from now and was given 130,000 or 140,000 as the total for the whole Army, including the tail, if he thinks that he could make an Army which could look at our commitments in advance of any settlement with N.A.T.O. about reduction? I say that is unrealistic. My quarrel with the Motion is that it is illogical; it is like ordering the bricks for a house before having a consultation with an architect. To take

this action is to predetermine manpower figures before it is possible to do it.
I wish to clarify this matter of a 200,000 Army. That idea has gained currency by often being spoken about. It has almost come to be regarded as a Government statement that we should have an Army of 200,000.

Mr. Stokes: Well, is it not?

Mr. Head: The right hon. Gentleman is always running ahead of me.
This figure of 200,000 originated from hon. Gentlemen opposite so far as concerns the debate in this House. Its true origin—I will be frank—is that we in the War Office and the Chiefs of Staff would like to be rid of National Service. I have never said otherwise. We thought it worth while to examine hypothetically the size of an Army which we might get by voluntary recruitment, and it does not need a genius to hit on the figure of 200,000. We got that number and we examined it purely on our own. It had nothing to do with policy at that stage, which was some time ago. That examination continues.
The object of the examination is to see whether, if we only had 200,000, assuming greater mobility by Transport Command and a greater degree of civilianisation and other economies in the tail, such a number could provide a force which would be adequate for our commitments. That is the stage of this inquiry.
Hon. Gentlemen opposite have taken this 200,000 to their bosom and have cut bits off it. The right hon. Member for Bassetlaw (Mr. Bellenger) turned it into 150,000 and asked whether I would not prefer that figure for the Regular Army. From a purely personal point of view, with no commitments, the answer is "Yes". I could go on leave. With commitments, I cannot, because we cannot decide where we might want it. We must have a chance of meeting our commitments to N.A.T.O., throughout the Commonwealth and to the vital economic and strategic interests of this country. If we were to plunge into the abolition of National Service without regard to our commitments and to the consequences, I maintain that that would be an irresponsible action.

Mr. Stokes: Will the Secretary of State deal with the question, "Where are the


400,000?" That was the undertaking given by the Minister of Labour, comprising 136,000 to fulfil our commitments in the Army and 264,000 here. What are they doing?

Mr. Head: The right hon. Gentleman has backed three winners running, because that was the next point on my notes. He knows in advance what I am going to talk about. The right hon. Member for Belper said to me, "You have in this country 263,000 men, in addition to 136,000 overseas." Those figures are utterly and absolutely incorrect by very large proportions indeed. They are vastly incorrect.

Mr. Stokes: What are they?

Mr. Head: The right hon. Gentleman must let me make my speech. We have never, not for reasons of any shame but for reasons of security—all right hon. Gentlemen will back me up—disclosed the exact figures. I am going further than that. The figures of troops in this country include the training organisation and a far larger number of troops in the home and strategic reserve than we have ever achieved before. That is right and proper, from the points of view of safety and of balance for the Regular Army. These numbers together are not far from balancing the total overseas. That I believe to be a satisfactory state of affairs. The figures quoted by the right hon. Member for Belper are entirely and absolutely wrong, and if I were he I would entirely do away with the source that gave them to me.

Mr. G. Brown: Those figures were the best that we could extract from the information which the right hon. Gentleman makes available. They are figures which appeared, I think, first of all publicly in The Times some time ago. The right hon. Gentleman has since spoken in this House, as have other Ministers, and the figures have so far never been corrected. If the right hon. Gentleman now says that we are all wrong, everybody who tried to add up the information that we got, does he not think it is about time that he told us where the troops are deployed? [HON. MEMBERS: "Why?"] Because everybody else knows except this House.

Mr. Hugh Fraser: How does the right hon. Member know that everyone else knows?

Mr. Brown: Because any foreign agent can discover it. Quite honestly, it is not good enough for Ministers to assert that figures are outrageously wrong when we have only their unsupported assertion about it. [HON. MEMBERS: "Oh."] Certainly. [HON. MEMBERS: "Sit down."] Hon. Members will never get me down in that way. I ask the Secretary of State to consider the point that I put to him earlier today. How much more information than we now have can he safely give us that we may check the assertion he has now made?

Mr. Head: I cannot help feeling that if what the right hon. Gentleman has said about this widespread knowledge is right, he himself must be a little out of touch. I am not denying that the information might be known, but it is invaluable for an intelligence service to get an accurate check on whether reports that it gets from agents are correct or not. That is the reason. I am constantly being asked to say whether or not The Times correspondent is right. Very often he is extremely good, but he is hung round my neck practically as though he were a member of my staff.
I have been asked a number of questions, and if I do not answer some of them the right hon. Member for Belper must take a little of the blame because he made quite an oration. In particular I should like to say a word to the hon. Member for Dudley concerning swept wing fighters. I see that he has just landed in the Chamber in time to hear this. He asserted that we were short of swept wing fighters in the Middle East. I do not wish in any way to get on bad terms with the hon. Gentleman, and, although this is a problem which is not my particular concern, I am authorised by the Secretary of State for Air to state, as he stated in his Air Estimates speech, that this is a matter which can be put right very rapidly owing to the range and mobility of modern fighters. The permanent stationing of fighters of this range and mobility in the Middle East would not really be sensible because of their rapid mobility if and when they should be wanted.
I am afraid that I shall have to resume my seat very shortly. I have tried in this debate to show that it is the Government's job to decide on the allocation of our


resources between the economy and defence. That has always been a difficult job, and there is nobody more aware than the Service Ministers and the chiefs of staff of the futility of having big defences and a busted economy. That fact is never credited to us but we are well aware of it.
On the other hand, there are dreadful warnings in the past of undue cuts in defence because the sun has come out and the economy wants a lot more. Our problem is to strike a balance between those two. I would remind hon. Members who are too optimistic about what should be done that when one comes, as the Prime Minister and the Minister of Defence do, to the ultimate decision it is

a very lonely pinnacle on which one stands to decide between the rival claims of these two matters.

There is one thing that the Government should determine to do, and that is to reduce and relieve the burden on our economy to the maximum extent but not to that extent which may lead us to fail in our own responsibilities and by our example to cause defection in the collective defence of the West.

Question put, That the words proposed to be left out stand part of the Question:—

The House divided: Ayes 240. Noes 308.

Division No. 276.]
AYES
[10.0 p.m.


Ainsley, J. W.
Donnelly, D. L.
Jones, Elwyn, (W. Ham, S.)


Albu, A. H.
Dugdale, Rt. Hn. John (W. Brmwch)
Jones, Jack (Rotherham)


Allaun, Frank (Salford, E.)
Dye, S.
Jones, J. Idwal (Wrexham)


Allen, Arthur (Bosworth)
Edelman, M.
Jones, T. W. (Merioneth)


Anderson, Frank
Edwards, Rt. Hon. Ness (Caerphilly)
Kenyon, C.


Awbery, S. S.
Edwards, Robert (Bilston)
Key, Rt. Hon. C. W.


Bacon, Miss Alice
Edwards, W. J. (Stepney)
King, Dr. H. M.


Baird, J.
Evans, Albert (Islington, S. W.)
Lawson, G. M.


Bellenger, Rt. Hon. F. J.
Evans, Edward (Lowestoft)
Lee, Frederick (Newton)


Bence, C. R. (Dunbartonshire,E.)
Evans, Stanley (Wednesbury)
Lee, Miss Jennie (Cannock)


Benn, Hn. Wedgwood (Bristol, S.E.)
Fernyhough, E.
Lever, Harold (Cheetham)


Benson, G.
Finch, H. J.
Lever, Leslie (Ardwick)


Beswick, F.
Fletcher, Eric
Lewis, Arthur


Bevan, Rt. Hon. A. (Ebbw Vale)
Fraser, Thomas (Hamilton)
Lindgren, G. S.


Blackburn, F.
Gaitskell, Rt. Hon. H. T. N.
Lipton, Lt.-Col. M.


Blenkinsop, A.
Gibson, C. W.
Logan, D. G.


Blyton, W. R.
Gooch, E. G.
Mabon, Dr. J. Dickson


Boardman, H.
Gordon Walker, Rt. Hon. P. G.
MacColl, J. E.


Bottomley, Rt. Hon. A. G.
Greenwood, Anthony
McInnes, J.


Bowden, H. W. (Leicester, S. W.)
Grenfell, Rt. Hon. D. R.
McKay, John (Wallsend)


Bowen, E. R. (Cardigan)
Grey, C. F.
McLeavy, Frank


Bowles, F. G.
Griffiths, David (Rother Valley)
MacPherson, Malcolm (Stirling)


Boyd, T. C.
Griffiths, Rt. Hon. James (Llanelly)
Mahon, Simon


Braddock, Mrs. Elizabeth
Griffiths, William (Exchange)
Mallalieu, E. L. (Brigg)


Brockway, A. F.
Grimond, J.
Mallalieu, J. P. W. (Huddersfd, E.)


Broughton, Dr. A. D. D.
Hale, Leslie
Mann, Mrs. Jean


Brown, Rt. Hon. George (Belper)
Hall, Rt. Hn. Glenvil (Colne Valley)
Marquand, Rt. Hon. H. A.


Brown, Thomas (Ince)
Hamilton, W. W.
Mason, Roy


Burke, W. A.
Hannan, W.
Mayhew, C. P.


Burton, Miss F. E.
Hayman, F. H.
Messer, Sir F.


Butler, Herbert (Hackney, C.)
Healey, Denis
Mikardo, Ian


Butler, Mrs. Joyce (Wood Green)
Henderson, Rt. Hn. A. (Rwly Regis)
Mitchison, G. R.


Callaghan, L. J.
Herbison, Miss M.
Monslow, W.


Carmichael, J.
Hewitson, Capt. M.
Mort, D. L.


Castle, Mrs. B. A.
Hobson, C. R.
Moss, R.


Champion, A. J.
Holman, P.
Moyle, A.


Chapman, W. D.
Holmes, Horace
Mulley, F. W.


Chetwynd, G. R
Holt, A. F.
Neal, Harold (Bolsover)


Clunie, J.
Howell, Denis (All Saints)
Noel-Baker, Francis (Swindon)


Coldrick, W.
Hubbard, T. F.
Noel-Baker, Rt. Hon. P. (Derby, S.)


Collins, V. J.(Shoreditch &amp; Finsbury)
Hughes, Emrys (S. Ayrshire)
O'Brien, Sir Thomas


Corbet, Mrs. Freda
Hughes, Hector (Aberdeen, N.)
Oliver, G. H.


Cove, W. G.
Hunter, A. E.
Oram, A. E.


Craddock, George (Bradford, S.)
Hynd, H. (Accrington)
Orbach, M.


Cullen, Mrs. A.
Hynd, J. B. (Attercliffe)
Oswald, T.


Dalton, Rt. Hon. H.
Irvine, A. J. (Edge Hill)
Owen, W. J.


Darling, George (Hillsborough)
Irving, S. (Dartford)
Paget, R. T.


Davies,Rt.Hon.Clement(Montgomery)
Isaacs, Rt. Hon. G. A.
Paling, Rt. Hon. W. (Dearne Valley)


Davies, Ernest (Enfield, E.)
Janner, B.
Palmer, A. M. F.


Davies, Harold (Leek)
Jay, Rt. Hon. D. P. T.
Pannell, Charles (Leeds, W.)


Davies, Stephen (Merthyr)
Jeger, George (Goole)
Pargiter, G. A.


Deer, G.
Jeger, Mrs. Lena (Holbn &amp; St. Pncs,S.)
Parker, J.


de Freitas, Geoffrey
Johnson, James (Rugby)
Parkin, B. T.


Delargy, H. J.
Johnston, Douglas (Paisley)
Peart, T. F.


Dodds, N. N.
Jones, David (The Hartlepools)
Price, J. T. (Westhoughton)




Price, Philips (Gloucestershire, W.)
Sorensen, R. W.
Wells, Percy (Faversham)


Probert, A. R.
Soskice, Rt. Hon. Sir Frank
Wells, William (Walsall, N.)


Proctor, W. T.
Sparks, J. A.
West, D. G.


Pryde, D. J.
Steele, T.
Wheeldon, W. E.


Pursey, Cmdr. H.
Stewart, Michael (Fulham)
White, Mrs. Eirene (E. Flint)


Randall, H. E.
Stokes, Rt. Hon. R. R. (Ipswich)
White, Henry (Derbyshire, N. E.)


Rankin, John
Stones, W. (Consett)
Wilcock, Group Capt. C. A. B.


Redhead, E. C.
Strachey, Rt. Hon. J.
Wilkins, W. A.


Reeves, J.
Stross,Dr.Barnett(Stoke-on-Trent,C.)
Willey, Frederick


Reid, William
Summerskill, Rt. Hon. E.
Williams, David (Neath)


Robens, Rt. Hon. A.
Swingler, S. T.
Williams, Rev. Llywelyn (Ab'tillery)


Roberts, Albert (Normanton)
Sylvester, G. O.
Williams, Rt. Hon. T. (Don Valley)


Roberts, Goronwy (Caernarvon)
Taylor, Bernard (Mansfield)
Williams, W. R. (Openshaw)


Robinson, Kenneth (St. Pancras, N.)
Taylor, John (West Lothian)
Williams, W. T. (Barons Court)


Rogers, George (Kensington, N.)
Thomas, Iorwerth (Rhondda, W.)
Willis, Eustace (Edinburgh, E.)


Shawcross, Rt. Hon. Sir Hartley
Thomson, George (Dundee, E.)
Wilson. Rt. Hon. Harold (Huyton)


Shinwell, Rt. Hon. E.
Timmons, J.
Winterbottom, Richard


Short, E. W.
Tomney, F.
Woodburn, Rt. Hon. A.


Shurmer, P. L. E.
Turner-Samuels, M.
Woof, R. E.


Silverman, Julius (Aston)
Ungoed-Thomas, Sir Lynn
Yates, V. (Ladywood)


Silverman, Sydney (Nelson)
Usborne, H. G.
Younger, Rt. Hon. K.


Simmons, C. J. (Brierley Hill)
Viant, S. P.
Zilliacus, K.


Skeffington, A. M.
Wade, D. W.



Slater, J. (Sedgefield)
Warbey, W. N.
TELLERS FOR THE AYES:


Smith, Ellis (Stoke, S.)
Watkins, T. E.
Mr. Popplewell and Mr. Pearson.


Snow. J. W.
Weitzman, D.





NOES


Agnew, Cmdr. P. G.
Cordeaux, Lt.-Col. J. K.
Hare, Rt. Hon. J. H.


Aitken, W. T.
Corfield, Capt. F. V.
Harris, Frederic (Croydon, N. W.)


Allan, R. A. (Paddington, S.)
Craddock, Beresford (Spelthorne)
Harris, Reader (Heston)


Alport, C. J. M.
Crouch, R. F.
Harrison, A. B. C. (Maldon)


Amery, Julian (Preston, N.)
Crowder, Petre (Ruislip—Northwood)
Harrison, Col. J. H. (Eye)


Amory, Rt. Hn. Heathcoat(Tiverton)
Cunningham, Knox
Harvey, Air Cdre. A. V. (Macclesfd)


Anstruther-Gray, Major Sir William
Currie, G. B. H.
Harvey, Ian (Harrow, E.)


Arbuthnot, John
Dance, J. C. G.
Harvey, John (Walthamstow, E.)


Armstrong, C. W.
Davidson, Viscountess
Harvie-Watt, Sir George


Ashton, H.
D'Avigdor-Goldsmid, Sir Henry
Hay, John


Astor, Hon. J. J.
Deedes, W. F.
Head, Rt. Hon. A. H.


Atkins, H. E.
Digby, Simon Wingfield
Heald, Rt. Hon. Sir Lionel


Baldock, Lt.-Cmdr. J. M.
Dodds-Parker, A. D.
Henderson, John (Cathcart)


Baldwin, A. E.
Donaldson, Cmdr. C. E. McA.
Hicks-Beach, Maj. W. W.


Balniel, Lord
Drayson, G. B.
Hill, Rt. Hon. Charles (Luton)


Banks, Col. C.
du Cann, E. D. L.
Hill, Mrs. E. (Wythenshawe)


Barber, Anthony
Dugdale, Rt.Hn. Sir T. (Richmond)
Hill, John (S. Norfok)


Barlow, Sir John
Duncan, Capt. J. A. L.
Hinchingbrooke, Viscount


Barter, John
Duthie, W. S.
Holland-Martin, C. J.


Baxter, Sir Beverley
Eccles, Rt. Hon. Sir David
Hope, Lord John


Beamish, Maj. Tufton
Eden,Rt.Hn.Sir A (Warwick&amp;L'm'tn)
Hornby, R. P.


Bell, Philip (Bolton, E.)
Eden, J. B. (Bournemouth, West)
Hornsby-Smith, Miss M. P.


Bennett, F. M. (Torquay)
Elliot, Rt. Hon. W. E.
Horobin, Sir Ian


Bennett, Dr. Reginald
Emmet, Hon. Mrs. Evelyn
Horsbrugh, Rt. Hon. Dame Florence


Bevins, J. R. (Toxteth)
Errington, Sir Eric
Howard, Gerald (Cambridgeshire)


Bidgood, J. C.
Erroll, F. J.
Howard, Hon. Greville (St. Ives)


Biggs-Davison, J. A.
Farey-Jones, F. W.
Howard, John (Test)


Birch, Rt. Hon. Nigel
Fell, A.
Hudson, Sir Austin (Lewisham, N.)


Bishop, F. P.
Finlay, Graeme
Hudson, W. R. A. (Hull, N.)


Black, C. W.
Fisher, Nigel
Hughes Hallett, Vice-Admiral J.


Body, R. F.
Fletcher-Cooke, C.
Hughes-Young, M. H. C.


Boothby, Sir Robert
Fort, R.
Hulbert, Sir Norman


Bossom, Sir Alfred
Foster, John
Hurd, A. R.


Boyd-Carpenter, Rt. Hon. J. A.
Fraser, Hon. Hugh (Stone)
Hutchison, Sir Ian Clark (E'b'gh,W.)


Boyle, Sir Edward
Fraser, Sir Ian (M'cmbe &amp; Lonsdale)
Hutchison, Sir James (Scotstoun)


Braine, B. R.
Freeth, D. K.
Hyde, Montgomery


Braithwaite, Sir Albert (Harrow, W.)
Gammans, Sir David
Hylton-Foster, Sir H. B. H.


Bromley-Davenport, Lt.-Col. W. H.
Garner-Evans, E. H.
Iremonger, T. L.


Brooke, Rt. Hon. Henry
George, J. C. (Pollok)
Irvine, Bryant Godman (Rye)


Brooman-White, R. C.
Gibson-Watt, D.
Jenkins, Robert (Dulwich)


Browne, J. Nixon (Craigton)
Glover, D.
Jennings, J. C. (Burton)


Bryan, P.
Godber, J. B.
Jennings, Sir Roland (Hallam)




Johnson, Dr. Donald (Carlisle)


Buchan-Hepburn, Rt. Hon. P. G. T.
Gomme-Duncan, Col. Sir Alan
Johnson, Eric (Blackley)


Bullus, Wing Commander E. E.
Gough, C. F. H.
Johnson, Howard (Kemptown)


Butcher, Sir Herbert
Gower, H. R.
Jones, Rt. Hon. Aubrey (Hall Green)


Butler, Rt. Hn. R. A.(Saffron Walden)
Graham, Sir Fergus
Joseph, Sir Keith


Carr, Robert
Grant, W. (Woodside)
Joynson-Hicks, Hon. Sir Lancelot


Cary, Sir Robert
Grant-Ferris, Wg Cdr. R. (Nantwich)
Kaberry, D.


Channon, H.
Green, A.
Keegan, D.


Chichester-Clark, R.
Gresham Cooke, R.
Kerby, Capt. H. B.


Clarke, Brig. Terence (Portsmth, W.)
Grimston, Hon. John (St. Albans)
Kerr, H. W.


Cole, Norman
Grimston, Sir Robert (Westbury)
Kershaw, J. A.


Conant, Maj. Sir Roger
Grosvenor, Lt.-Col. R. G.
Kimball, M.


Cooper, A. E.
Gurden, Harold
Kirk, P. M.


Cooper-Key, E. M.
Hall, John (Wycombe)
Lagden, G. W.







Lambert, Hon. G.
Nicholls, Harmar
Spence, H. R. (Aberdeen, W.)


Lambton, Viscount
Nicholson, Godfrey (Farnham)
Spens, Rt. Hn. Sir P. (Kens'gt'n, S.)


Lancaster, Col. C. G.
Nicolson, N. (B'n'm'th, E. & Chr'ch)
Stanley, Capt. Hon. Richard


Langford-Holt, J. A.
Nugent, G. R. H.
Stevens, Geoffrey


Leather, E. H. C.
Nutting, Rt. Hon. Anthony
Steward, Harold (Stockport, S.)


Leavey, J. A.
O'Neill, Hn. Phelim (Co. Antrim, N.)
Stewart, Henderson (Fife, E.)


Legge-Bourke, Maj. E. A. H.
Ormsby-Gore, Hon. W. D.
Stoddart-Scott, Col. M.


Legh, Hon. Peter (Petersfield)
Orr, Capt. L. P. S.
Stuart, Rt. Hon. James (Moray)


Lennox-Boyd, Rt. Hon. A. T.
Orr-Ewing, Charles Ian (Hendon, N.)
Studholme, Sir Henry


Lindsay, Hon. James (Devon, N.)
Orr-Ewing, Sir Ian (Weston-S-Mare)
Summers, Sir Spencer


Linstead, Sir H. N.
Osborne, C.
Taylor, Sir Charles (Eastbourne)


Llewellyn, D. T.
Page, R. G.
Taylor, William (Bradford, N.)


Lloyd, Maj. Sir Guy (Renfrew, E.)
Pannell, N. A. (Kirkdale)
Teeling, W.


Lloyd, Rt. Hon. Selwyn (Wirral)
Partridge, E.
Thomas, Leslie (Canterbury)


Lloyd-George, Maj. Rt. Hon. G.
Pickthorn, K. W. M.
Thomas, P. J. M. (Conway)


Longden, Gilbert
Pilkington, Capt. R. A.
Thompson, Kenneth (Walton)


Low, R. Hon. A. R. W.
Pitman, I. J.
Thompson, Lt.-Cdr. R.(Croydon, S.)


Lucas, Sir Jocelyn (Portsmouth, S.)
Pitt, Miss E. M.
Thorneycroft, Rt. Hon. P.


Lucas-Tooth, Sir Hugh
Pott, H. P.
Thornton-Kemsley, C. N.


Macdonald, Sir Peter
Powell, J. Enoch
Tiley, A. (Bradford, W.)


McKibbin, A. J.
Price, Henry (Lewisham, W.)
Tilney, John (Wavertree)


Maskie, J. H. (Galloway)
Prior-Palmer, Brig. O. L.
Touche, Sir Gordon


McLaughlin, Mrs. P.
Profumo, J. D.
Turton, Rt. Hon. R. H.


Maclay, Rt. Hon. John
Raikes, Sir Victor
Tweedsmuir, Lady


Maclean, Fitzroy (Lancaster)
Ramsden, J. E.
Vane, W. M. F.


McLean, Neil (Inverness)
Redmayne, M.
Vaughan-Morgan, [...] K.


Macleod, R. Hn. Iain (Enfield, W.)
Rees-Davies, W. R.
Vickers, Miss J. H.


MacLeod, John (Ross & Cromarty)
Remnant, Hon. P.
Vosper, D. F.


Macmillan, Rt.Hn.Harold(Bromley)
Renton, D. L. M.
Wakefield, Edward (Derbyshire, W.)


Macpherson, Niall (Dumfries)
Ridsdale, J. E.
Wakefield, Sir Wavell (St. M'lebone)


Maddan, Martin
Rippon, A. G. F.
Walker-Smith, D. C.


Maitland, Cdr. J. F. W. (Horncastle)
Roberts, Sir Peter (Heeley)
Wall, Major Patrick


Manningham-Buller, Rt. Hn. Sir R.
Robinson, Sir Roland (Blackpool, S.)
Ward, Hon. George (Worcester)


Markham, Major Sir Frank




Marlowe, A. A. H.
Robson-Brown, W.
Ward, Dame Irene (Tynemouth)


Marshall, Douglas
Rodgers, John (Sevenoaks)
Waterhouse, Capt. Rt. Hon. C.


Mathew, R.
Roper, Sir Harold
Watkinson, Rt. Hon. Harold


Maude, Angus
Ropner, Col. Sir Leonard
Webbe, Sir H.


Maudling, Rt. Hon. R.
Russell, R. S.
Whitelaw, W. S. I.(Penrith & Border)


Mawby, R. L.
Sandys, Rt. Hon. D.
Williams, Paul (Sunderland, S.)


Maydon, Lt.-Comdr. S. L. C.
Schofield, Lt.-Col. W.
Williams, R. Dudley (Exeter)


Medlicott, Sir Frank
Sharples, R. C.
Wills, G. (Bridgwater)


Milligan, Rt. Hon. W. R.
Shepherd, William
Wilson, Geoffrey (Truro)


Molson, Rt. Hon. Hugh
Simon, J. E. S. (Middlesbrough, W.)
Wood, Hon. R.


Morrison, John (Salisbury)
Smithers, Peter (Winchester)
Woollam, John Victor


Mott-Radclyffe, C. E.
Smyth, Brig. Sir John (Norwood)
Yates, William (The Wrekin)


Nabarro, G. D. N.
Soames, Capt. C.



Nairn, D. L. S.
Spearman, Sir Alexander
TELLERS FOR THE NOES:


Neave, Airey
Speir, R. M.
Mr. Heath and




Mr. T. D. G. Galbraith.


Main Question, as amended, put and agreed to.

Proposed words there added.

Resolved,
That this House affirms its support for Her Majesty's Government in their declared

aim of seeking in concert with their Allies a reduction in the demands made by the defence services on the manpower and material resources of the country so far as is consistent with both the safety of these islands, the Commonwealth and the Colonial and dependent territories, and the effective discharge of their international commitments.

Orders of the Day — SELECT COMMITTEE ON PROCEDURE

10.11 p.m.

The Secretary of State for the Home Department and Minister for Welsh Affairs (Major Gwilym Lloyd-George): I beg to move,

5
That a Select Committee be appointed to consider the practice of moving amendments on going into Committee of Supply upon the Navy, Army, Air and Civil Estimates; the practice relating to Money Resolutions; the extension of the Standing Orders relating to public money to expenditure from Funds partly, but not wholly, financed from the Exchequer, being expenditure not directly involving a charge upon the Consolidated Fund or upon money provided by Parliament; the numbers required to form a Quorum of, and for the Closure in, a Standing Committee; and the constitution of the Scottish Standing Committee, and to report whether any changes are desirable in the Standing Orders, practice or procedure of the House in these matters


10
or in matters connected therewith:

The House will remember that on 14th June my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister said that it was proposed to ask the House to agree to the setting up of a Select Committee to consider certain matters of procedure to which attention had recently been drawn and that a Motion would be tabled in due course. There are four matters which it is proposed should be considered by the Select Committee.

The first of these is the practice of moving Amendments on going into Committee of Supply on the Service Estimates. The three days in question are the major annual debates on the Service Departments and they are opened with a very full statement by the Ministers in charge. The argument has been advanced that the value of the debate is impaired by the intervention of the Amendment, usually after only three or four speeches have been delivered, and it is contended that it diverts the attention of the House from the general review on the state of the Service to a matter which, however important it may be, is usually only a limited issue. One example is that which occurred on the Navy Estimates debate, in 1952, when Mr. Follick moved an Amendment to draw attention to phonetic spelling. That is one of the objections. On the other hand, it may be said that the right of private Members, determined by the Ballot, to raise a particular matter is a valuable one which ought not lightly to be abandoned.

Representations were made that the matter should be discussed through the

usual channels and on 13th December last the Prime Minister, in answer to a Question by the hon. Member for Dudley (Mr. Wigg), stated that exploratory discussions indicated that at that time there was no comprehensive support for an alteration in the practice of the House, but that the Government would certainly consider the suggestion that the matter should be examined by a Select Committee.

The second matter is the number required for a quorum and for the closure in Standing Committees. These figures at the moment are respectively 15 and 20, and as the Standing Orders provide for Standing Committees of from 20 to 50, it is considered that the 15 and 20 may be unnecessarily large and proportionately much larger than the figures required in the House itself. The result is that smaller Committees cannot effectively be used on those occasions when it would be desirable to do so.

The third matter relates to Scottish business in Standing Committee. We would ask the Select Committee to consider whether the Committee stage of Scottish Bills could more appropriately be considered by a smaller Committee than the full Scottish Grand Committee which is, of course, appreciably greater than any Standing Committee considering equivalent non-Scottish Bills at the Committee stage.

The last matter which it is proposed that the Committee should examine relates to Money Resolutions. The Opposition wishes the Committee to consider whether the drafting of Money


Resolutions is unduly restrictive. It is also proposed that the Committee should be asked to examine whether the relevant Standing Orders should be extended to funds partly, but not wholly, financed from the Exchequer, such as the National Insurance Fund. I notice that there are one or two Amendments on the Order Paper which would ask the Committee to undertake a much fuller investigation.

I would say on that that when my right hon. Friend announced that he was going to put these four points to the Select Committee he said at the time, and I understand that the Leader of the Opposition agreed, that, in view of the fact that it was only five years since there was a very full investigation by a Select Committee and that a good many of its recommendations had since been implemented, it would not be appropriate, after so short an interval, to have another reference to the Committee of a wider nature than the four points which have been suggested.

Viscount Hinchingbrooke: The Sir Robert Gower Select Committee on Procedure sat in 1946 and reported in 1947. That is more than five years ago.

Major Lloyd-George: I accept that, but the fact is that in any case it is a short period. [An HON. MEMBER: "Ten years."] If the hon. Gentleman looks back he will find that there was one in 1914, another in 1931 and 1932 and the last in 1945. That is my recollection, but I think that is roughly what it was.

Mr. Wedgwood Benn: In the last 110 years there have been 13 Select Committees, which is more than one every ten years.

Major Lloyd-George: I have given the dates from 1914, which is quite a long time back. I would only say to the hon. Member for Bristol, South-East (Mr. Benn), who interrupted me, that this is a matter for the House of Commons.
I am only suggesting that my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister thought at the time, and said so, that in his view the time was hardly long enough ago to warrant another investigation into the wider procedure, and that at the time the right hon. Gentleman the Leader of the Opposition agreed with him. As my right

hon. Friend said at the time, it is a matter for the House of Commons, and, of course, we shall listen to what the House has to say. This is not a party matter at all. My right hon. Friend pointed out that it would be unusual to have a review of so wide a nature so soon after the last one.
We have now reached an advanced point in the life of the Session, but we nevertheless believe that there will be value in setting up the Committee even if there is little prospect of it completing its work until the new Session. The points relating to Supply and the Scottish Standing Committee are ones on which the early recommendations of the Committee will be particularly valuable, and we hope that it may feel able to turn its attentions first to those. I would add, in conclusion, that Ministers will, of course, be ready to put forward views on all the matters if invited by the Select Committee to do so.

10.20 p.m.

Mr. Emrys Hughes: I beg to move, in line 7, to leave out from "Committee" to "and" in line 8.
I submit that if the whole question of the Scottish Standing Committee is to be referred to the Select Committee, that Select Committee should have on it a far greater proportion of Scottish Members. I should like to know, first, why this proposal has been added rather as an after-thought to this Motion. Those of us who regularly attend the Scottish Standing Committee think that the Committee could be considerably improved.
Those of us who remember the passing through the Committee of the Valuation and Rating (Scotland) Bill know exactly what is wrong with it. One of the things wrong with it, shown during the progress of that Bill, was that three-quarters of hon. Members opposite never appeared in the Committee except to vote. They were absent friends, but that is not one of the faults of the Scottish Standing Committee which the Home Secretary is trying to rectify. We should like to have from the right hon. and gallant Gentleman an assurance that if the Scottish Grand Committee is to be inquired into, the inquiry will be comprehensive and not merely concerned with the aspect to which he referred.
I do not know how many of the proposed members of the Select Committee have had any experience of working in the Scottish Standing Committee. Only three out of the proposed 16 members of the Select Committee are Scottish. There is only one of my right hon. Friends among them and he will be in a hopeless minority in putting the Scottish point of view. In a recent broadcast in which the right hon. Member for Kelvingrove (Mr. Elliot) took part, it was said that the Angles invaded this country and that the acute Angles went north and the obtuse Angles came south. The majority of those who are proposed to be appointed to this Select Committee are obtuse Angles as far as Scottish affairs are concerned.
Many of us would like to put forward constructive amendments which would greatly improve the proceedings of the Scottish Standing Committee. Is the only reference to the Select Committee the one indicated by the Home Secretary? Would we be able to ask the Committee to inquire whether the Scottish Standing Committee could meet in Scotland? That is a matter about which there is a good deal of difference of opinion on both sides of the House.
When I asked the Prime Minister whether this could be discussed, he brushed the matter aside by saying that a Royal Commission had decided against it. With all respect to Royal Commissions, since when has a Royal Commission been empowered to decide the proceedings of the House of Commons? That, finally, should be the prerogative of hon. Members.
There are other aspects of deciding how we can make the Scottish Standing Committee more useful. I have a suggestion which has not received by any means unanimous approval on either side of the House, but which deserves to be examined a little more closely. It is that purely Scottish Questions might be asked and answered in the Scottish Standing Committee. That would be advantageous from two points of view. It would enable Scottish Members more closely to cross-examine the Ministers. We would see the Secretary of State for Scotland a little more often. We would be able to get at the battery of Scottish Under-Secretaries

and find out exactly what were their functions. In that way we would be able to keep a much closer eye on the administration of the affairs of Scotland.
I do not ask for the immediate acceptance of this proposal, but I suggest that if the Scottish Grand Committee is to fulfil its duty to Scotland that would be a useful innovation. Of course, it would be objected to merely because it is an innovation. I understand that it takes about twenty years for an idea, once ventilated, to become practical politics, so I am giving twenty years' notice.
I ask that this question should be examined carefully: would the Scottish Grand Committee not fulfil a more useful function to Scotland if we had an opportunity of getting to closer grips with the administrative and legislative problems of Scotland? If allowed, I am quite prepared to give to the Select Committee evidence that this would be a useful innovation. Here I could appeal to the more obtuse Angles, because it would also serve to transfer a large number of Scottish Questions, dealing with purely Scottish affairs, from the Floor of the House.
We all know that there are now so many Questions on the Order Paper, and there is such difficulty in Mr. Speaker seeing everybody who wants to ask supplementary questions, that the result is that we do not get sufficient supplementary questions, and hon. Members from other parts of the country are apt to be impatient with hon. Members from Scottish constituencies. [HON. MEMBERS: "Hear, hear."] I hope I am beginning to get some support.
In addition, it also affects other Ministers—

Mr. James McInnes: Would my hon. Friend explain to us what would be the position of an English Member who is not a Member of the Scottish Grand Committee but who desires to put a Question to a Scottish Minister?

Mr. Hughes: I would have no objection to his coming as a sort of fraternal delegate, but that problem so rarely arises in the normal course of Questions that I do not think it would affect my general argument.
What I say is that the affairs of the Scottish Standing Committee are so important that they should not be referred to this Select Committee, which is to consider a large assortment of other matters. If my Amendment is carried, it will be a recommendation to the Government that they should have a special Committee, largely composed of hon. Members from Scottish constituencies, who know the defects of the Scottish Grand Committee, and who would be in a position to bring forward useful and constructive suggestions.

10.29 p.m.

Mr. Hector Hughes: I beg to second the Amendment.
As my hon. Friend the Member for South Ayrshire (Mr. Emrys Hughes) has played about with angles, acute and obtuse, I shall present an argument which I hope will recommend itself to the House as a rectangle. I wish to suggest some considerations other than those presented by my hon. Friend.
I support this Amendment because it seeks to exclude the Scottish Standing Committee from the terms of reference of the Select Committee. I support it for the following reasons. The Motion embodies ideas which are premature, unfair, confusing and unduly controversial. I say that they are premature because they are designed to affect the Scottish Standing Committee which was constituted comparatively recently. It has been in operation now for only six years. It has done good work. It has never been the object of serious criticism and, in my submission, it should now be left untrammelled to continue the good work which it has done since it was constituted.
I submit that it is bad for Parliament and for public business to tinker with and to alter procedure and institutions until they are given an adequate opportunity, for a considerable time, of being proved in operation. This Standing Committee has not yet had sufficient time to prove itself or to develop defects or to invite adverse criticism. Certainly, it has not invited adverse criticism. The general opinion is that the Scottish Standing Committee has done very well indeed.

Whatever may be said of the other proposals in this Motion, the kind of criticism that can be levelled against them is not the kind of criticism which can be levelled against the Scottish Standing Committee.
In its short existence the Scottish Standing Committee—I say this with particular reference to my hon. Friend the Member for South Ayrshire—has developed considerable dialectical thrust. It has shown statesmanship in its approach to the various problems which have come before it. It has provided a dignified and effective way of dealing with the Bills that have come before it, and it has done very effective and useful legislative work. For these reasons, I suggest that it would be completely wrong to attempt to put it within the terms of reference of this proposed Select Committee. The Scottish Standing Committee was set up not in haste, not without preliminary planning, and it has worked well, and we should say to the Government, "Hands off the Scottish Standing Committee."
As the lives of parliamentary institutions go, it is not long since my right hon. Friend the Member for East Stirlingshire (Mr. Woodburn), when Secretary of State for Scotland, introduced the new Standing Orders for Scottish business. He then reviewed the historical rivalries between England and Scotland. He reviewed the violence which had put great strain on the energies of both countries. He reviewed the uneasiness which had continued up to the day when he made that speech, and he expressed the hope that the proposals which he was then making, and which it is now sought to criticise and put before the Select Committee, would be a solution of those problems and would remove the difficulties and rivalries to which he referred.
Those proposals were not put before the House in an unconsidered way. They were put in a careful and deliberative way. He referred to the proposals of Mr. Tom Johnston in the Gilmour Report. He referred to the proposals of the hon. Member for Fife, East (Mr. Henderson Stewart), who is now a Joint Under-Secretary of State for Scotland. He referred to the proposals of the then Member for what was then the St.


Rollox division. He referred to the White Paper which was laid before the House on that subject, Cmd. 7308. So it is perfectly obvious that the proposals put before the House by my right hon. Friend the Member for East Stirlingshire were put in a considered and deliberate way after taking adequate evidence and doing everything that could have been done to evolve a system and a foundation for the Scottish Standing Committee which would bear the test of time.
Only six years have elapsed since that time, and the Scottish Standing Committee has not had sufficient time, if we judge it by time, in which to develop any defects. On the contrary, it has not developed defects; it has developed strength and good qualities. There is a further point. The proposals laid before the House by my right hon. Friend, which have been acted on ever since, were concessions to Scottish opinion in this matter. They were concessions which have stood their pragmatic test up to the moment, and the present system should not be thrown into a hotchpotch—in my submission, prematurely—and mixed up with various other ingredients in the brew which the Motion tonight presents to the House.
To do so at this early stage in the life of Parliament—and if it is not an early stage in this night at least it is an early stage in the life of the Scottish Standing Committee—would be wrong. It would be an insult to the whole Committee, which consists not only of every Scottish Member of Parliament but of a number of English and Welsh Members. It would be an insult to them and it would be flouting the widespread and intelligent Scottish opinion which supports the Scottish Standing Committee in which every political party is represented.
There is a further reason for saying that it would be premature to include the Scottish Standing Committee in this Motion. There has been no demand for its inclusion from Parliament, from the Committee itself, from the public or from the people of Scotland. The Committee deals exclusively with Scottish affairs. Until there is a demand for a change it should be left out of the terms of reference. It should be left alone

to continue to do the good work which it has done up to the present.
It will be trammelled and intimidated, if anything can intimidate a Scot, by the threat to its existence which its inclusion in the terms of the Motion would constitute. Its powers are adequate. It is doing very well indeed. If there were a demand for reconsideration, I submit that some other steps should be taken before it was included in a Motion such as this. Some of those steps would be these: the Scottish Standing Committee should be asked to consider whether there is anything wrong with it and, if so, what are its defects. It should be able to make recommendations itself. It should formulate its defects, and only after those two reasonable steps have been taken should it then be included in a Motion of this kind.
To include the proposal in this Motion is an insult not only to the Members of the Committee, but to the supporters of the Committee in Scotland and the people of Scotland who value it so highly.

10.40 p.m.

Mr. John Rankin: I support the Amendment which has been moved by my hon. Friend the Member for South Ayrshire (Mr. Emrys Hughes). Like him, I do not like the composition of the Select Committee which it is proposed to appoint. It contains only three Members, the right hon. Member for Kelvingrove (Mr. Elliot), the hon. and gallant Member for Berwick and East Lothian (Sir W. Anstruther-Gray) and my right hon. Friend the Member for East Stirlingshire (Mr. Woodburn), who have any knowledge of the background and atmosphere of Scottish affairs.
I am in no way depreciating the experience and qualities of the other Members of the Committee, but from my experience of eleven years' membership of the Scottish Standing Committee, there is not one Member of the Select Committee other than the three right hon. and hon. Gentlemen to whom I have referred who, at any time, has ever taken part in the work of the Scottish Standing Committee. I am not suggesting that those hon. Members are not interested in it, but their knowledge of the work of this Scottish Committee and their experience of its ways are negligible.
If there is to be any reform of the constitution of the Scottish Standing Committee, it ought to be done by those hon. Members on both sides of the House who have taken part in its work. For that reason, among others, I oppose the inclusion of the words referring to the Scottish Standing Committee in the Motion.
One thing surprises me. I am rather astonished at the absence from the list of the name of my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Brixton (Lieut.-Colonel Lipton). In view of his recent activities in Scottish affairs, I should have hoped that he would have been appointed a member of the Select Committee. I hope that the Government will take note of this and, in view of the wide knowledge of Scottish affairs which he has been displaying, perhaps elevate him from below the Gangway to membership of the Select Committee.
The purposes behind the Motion are clear. Every Labour Member of the Scottish Standing Committee is a full-time member. That is not true of hon. Gentlemen opposite. The real purpose is to restrict the activities of Scottish Labour Members who want to display their interest in Scottish educational affairs, Scottish agriculture, Scottish housing and all the other matters which interest hon. Members on this side of the House. The other purpose is to free right hon. and hon. Gentlemen opposite so that they may pursue their private ventures.
There have been repeated complaints in the Scottish Standing Committee, not only from Scottish Members but from co-opted Members, of being called upon too often to do the Parliamentary work they pledged themselves to do when they sought the suffrages of the electors. The Government seek to aid them by bringing in a constitution which will reduce the number of the Committee and free their colleagues who want to promote their own private wealth. [Interruption.] I am sorry if any Government supporter disputes that statement. It shows that he has no knowledge of what has been going on in the Committee in the last six months. The complaints have almost been voiced in the words I have used.
Reform of the Scottish Standing Committee was introduced by my right hon. Friend the Member for East Stirlingshire, and the Government of which he was a member, to elevate its status. The purpose of the present proposals is to diminish the status and responsibility of the Committee. To continue the good work of the Labour Government would mean more work for Government supporters on the Committee, which is what they seek to escape.
Any change in the constitution of the Committee should give it still further power. I should like it to have the form of a Parliament, able to consider Second Readings and Estimates as it now does, with power to remit to appropriate committees for detailed discussion or to the whole Scottish Standing Committee as it sees fit. It should have power to consider Bills on Report, to deal with Third Readings and to send to another place. Then the whole procedure could be formalised, as it must be in the long run, by this House. That is an extension of power which many people think would work and which would raise the tone, increase the interest in, and add to the responsibility of the Committee.
I honestly thought that the Government were thinking on lines of expansion when they added another Minister to the Government Front Bench, but evidently not. They are now proposing to reduce the size of this Committee. That approach is completely wrong. It will diminish when it ought to increase, and lower status when it ought to raise status, at a time when many people in Scotland are demanding increased power and importance for the Committee, which ought to function as a Scottish Parliament. I am not bothering at the moment about its location. I want the establishment of the body, and then the next step would take us back in the long run to a Parliament sitting in Scotland's ancient capital dealing with Scottish affairs. The Secretary of State, strange to say, is running away from Edinburgh. He is not getting nearer to it.
I hope that there will be second thoughts about this Select Committee: I hope that the words to which I am sure all of us on this side of the House object will be taken out and that a special Committee—I am not going further than


that—will be created to deal with a problem that has to be solved in a better way and along better lines than the Government now propose.

10.51 p.m.

The Secretary of State for Scotland (Mr. James Stuart): Perhaps I should say, in reply to some of the points which have been raised tonight, that I assure the hon. Member for South Ayrshire (Mr. Emrys Hughes) that tabling this Motion was no afterthought on the part of the Government. A great deal of thought has been given to it, and the fact that three Members of the House representing Scottish seats are on the Select Committee, two of whom are members of the Privy Council, shows the importance which has been attached to this matter.
Reference has been made to the changes made by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for East Stirlingshire (Mr. Woodburn) when he held my office, but I would just say that those affected the business which came before the Scottish Standing Committee and not the constitution of the Committee.
The Government feel—and I think that the House, in general, will agree—that any suggested or possible alteration in the status of a Standing Committee of this House should be a matter for consideration by the Select Committee upon whose advice, if the Select Committee should tender such advice, any change would be based.
The hon. Member for South Ayrshire referred to the views of the last Royal Commission. Of course, the Government must take their own view, but it is not for me to recommend to this House what changes should be made. We would await the advice of the Select Committee. It is not based on the views of the Royal Commission, because it is entirely a matter for the House to decide.
As I say, it is not for me to direct. We merely ask the House to set up the Select Committee to consider possible changes which I hope and believe, if agreed to by this House, would be improvements. As my right hon. and gallant Friend the Home Secretary said, we are not giving advice here and now, but if the Select Committee should wish for views they have only to ask members

of the Government and others to give their advice.

Mr. Emrys Hughes: Is it proposed that this Committee should have a roving commission to inquire into the whole constitution of the Scottish Standing Committee, or is it limited to the specific purposes which were suggested by the Home Secretary?

Mr. Stuart: The position today, as the hon. Member doubtless knows, is that after the findings of the Select Committee in 1945, which were implemented to a considerable degree in 1947 by the Labour Government, no change was made in the constitution of the Scottish Standing Committee.
The English Committees were reduced very considerably. I think it is worthy of consideration whether, instead of all Scottish hon. Members having their attention concentrated throughout on purely Scottish business, it would be right and proper that some of them should have some of their time available for sitting and serving on Committees dealing with United Kingdom Bills which apply to Scotland. That is a matter for the Select Committee to consider.

Mr. Hector Hughes: I want to draw the attention of the right hon. Gentleman to the difference between the sentence sought to be left out and the preceding sentence, which also deals with Standing Committees. The preceding sentence deals in a particular way with three features of Standing Committees in general, whereas the paragraph relating to the Scottish Standing Committee has a wider connotation and refers to the constitution of the Scottish Grand Committee without any limitation whatever.

Mr. Stuart: I think I answered that when I said that in 1947 the House agreed to certain proposals of the Select Committee of 1945 dealing with other Standing Committees which did not affect the constitution of the Scottish Standing Committee.
Reverting, as did the hon. and learned Member for Aberdeen, North (Mr. Hector Hughes), to the terms of reference of other Committees, at that time in reducing the size of the English Standing Committees, the numbers required for a closure or for forming a quorum, may


have escaped their notice. As the Home Secretary mentioned in his opening remarks, we have to have 20 Members to get a closure. Supposing, as is a possibility even in these days, that the Opposition—of whichever party—refused to take part in discussions in Committee and walked out, it would be very difficult for the Government to proceed with the business. That is the reason English Committees are dealt with in the preceding words, and when it comes to the Scottish Standing Committee the Motion states the constitution of that Committee because it was not affected in the 1947 amendments to the Standing Orders.
I will not go into the suggestion that Parliamentary Questions should be answered in Standing Committee, because the Prime Minister dealt with that the other day. It would, indeed, be an innovation which I think hon. Members on both sides of the House agree would not be acceptable.
The hon. Member for Govan (Mr. Rankin) said that the work of the proposed Select Committee would not be confined to the Scottish Standing Committee and that there should be a separate Committee to deal with that. I would ask him to remember that, for better or worse—I am not arguing the point—this is a United Kingdom Parliament and that there are others who have an interest in the management of the business of this House. I think it is entirely right and proper that it should be a matter for a Select Committee of the House, upon which there is strong Scottish representation. It is not for me to direct any Select Committee. It is not for any hon. Member or for the Government to do that. We are merely asking it to consider and advise as to whether, and, if so, how the machinery may be improved.

Mr. Rankin: Would not the right hon. Gentleman agree, even supposing that I took the point he has made, that the composition of this Select Committee is overwhelmingly non-Scottish on this problem?

Mr. Stuart: The answer is perfectly clear. If we take the composition of this House, and take three hon. Members out of 16, we get a very fair and adequate representation of Scottish opinion in relation to the whole House.

10.59 p.m.

Mr. A. Woodburn: I think I ought to say a few words, because when this matter was first proposed I raised the point on behalf of my hon. Friends that perhaps it was not the best way to proceed to have a Select Committee of the House examining a question which called for such detailed, intimate knowledge of the Scottish Grand Committee as could only be had by those who had experience of its working.
As a result of my intervention the Lord Privy Seal invited me and my hon. Friend the Member for Hamilton (Mr. T. Fraser) to meet him. We had an informal conversation and suggested that we ought to explore the possibility whether general agreement could not be reached among those who understood the problem, in order to make some decision which could be recommended to the House as an agreed decision. The Secretary of State was good enough to indicate to us some of the things which have been indicated by the Home Secretary and himself as being the Government view, and my hon. Friend the Member for Hamilton and I felt bound to advise him that we could see no possibility of getting general agreement from my hon. Friends with the proposition that he was making.
There therefore seemed no point m having a meeting of Scottish Members, which could only formally reach a decision that we thought it was bound to reach—that there was no agreement. Since we could see no possibility of an agreed recommendation being made to the House by the Scots themselves, we cannot, on the face of it, take exception to the Government proceeding to refer the matter to a Select Committee.
The Home Secretary referred to what the Committee would consider, but I think he will agree that when a Select Committee meets in the House it interprets its own remit and is in no way limited in what it considers by what the Home Secretary has said. All we can take from the Home Secretary's speech is that that is the proposition which the Government will put before the Select Committee, if they are invited to give evidence. It is equally open to any other hon. Member to give his opinion before the Select Committee on what should be done. While I cannot speak for the Committee, I am


sure, from my experience of previous Committees, that it will welcome any evidence given by those who know what they want.
The point which my hon. Friends should realise is that this Committee is set up by the House as judges; the Members of it are to hear evidence from people who know and to reach conclusions, presumably, on the evidence. There could be no objection, therefore, to my hon. Friends the Members for South Ayrshire (Mr. Emrys Hughes), Govan (Mr. Rankin) and others giving their views to the Select Committee, and I have no doubt that if they speak with their usual eloquence they will make a profound impact on the decisions of the Select Committee.

Mr. Rankin: Will my right hon. Friend urge the Government that when the Select Committee is dealing with the Scottish aspect of its work it should meet in Edinburgh, which will be of much greater convenience to Scottish Members?

Mr. Woodburn: Once this Committee has been set up the Government have nothing to do with what the Select Committee does. The Select Committee itself decides what it shall do and what is within the terms of its remit.
As far as I can see, therefore, it is rather difficult for us, in view of the fact that there is no likelihood of getting agreement, to urge that there should be a different Committee, because if that different Committee consisted of Scottish Members it would be bound to disagree, if our interpretation of our hon. Friends' views is correct.

Mr. E. G. Willis: Surely my right hon. Friend will agree that this Select Committee might disagree.

Mr. Woodburn: Yes, but if this Committee disagrees its report comes back to the House, and the House finally makes its decision one way or another on the Committee's recommendations and however many reports it makes.
I think that none of my hon. Friends can urge that the House has not a right to look at the working of the Scottish Grand Committee if it so desires. On the previous Committee, which dealt with the clergy, evidence was given before that Committee by people who were quite

outside the Scottish Grand Committee of the excellent work of the Scottish Grand Committee. I can assure my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Aberdeen, North (Mr. Hector Hughes) that the particular items which he thought were so valuable in the Scottish Grand Committee are not part of the suggestions for reform made by the Home Secretary.
The right hon. Gentleman has at least paid us the compliment of suggesting that these are not intended to be examined and that the only part that he is proposing to recommend for examination is that which has been in existence for much longer than eight years. The eight-year items are evidently free from examination as far as he is concerned.
I hope, therefore, that, since my hon. Friends will want to put suggestions to the Committee for improvements, they will realise that it would be undesirable to adopt the dog-in-the-manger attitude that a thing should never be examined or improved. I trust that they will allow the Committee to proceed in its investigation and will take the next step of giving evidence before it.

11.6 p.m.

Mr. David J. Pryde: I wish to place on record my unqualified antagonism to this suggestion, and I would remind the Secretary of State for Scotland that though Scotland may well be a part of the United Kingdom she is also a sovereign State.
The object of this procedure emanated from only a certain section of the Conservative Members opposite who do not want to discharge their full duty and obligations of the Act under which they were elected. There is no question about it that we Scottish Members have a deep-seated grievance here. We are told that the Lord Privy Seal sent for my right hon. Friend the Member for East Stirlingshire (Mr. Woodburn). Why did he send for him? Everyone knows perfectly well that the Scots Labour Group has an organisation in this House. We have a secretary and a chairman.
I consider that the whole procedure is worthy of the very closest examination, because we in Scotland believe that we have been treated in a most cavalier fashion. We are like the Duke of Argyll of old, who told Queen Caroline, "I am


going North tonight to see that my hounds are ready, because I have no intention of seeing Scotland turned into a deaf and dumb institution at Westminster."

Mr. Emrys Hughes: In view of the explanation given by my right hon. Friend the Member for East Stirlingshire (Mr. Woodburn), I beg to ask leave to withdraw the Amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

11.8 p.m.

Mr. Ellis Smith: I beg to move, in line 10, at the end, to insert:
and thereafter to consider what other alterations, if any, in the procedure of this House, are desirable for the more efficient despatch of public business.
Let me emphasise at once to hon. Members on both sides of the House that this is a House of Commons matter. My greatest desire would have been that this Chamber would have been packed for this debate with hon. Members on both sides. It is very unfortunate that we have reached this state of affairs, but it is no use complaining. Therefore, I plead with every hon. Member present that if he agrees with the reasoned case which we propose to submit he will be good enough, between now and when the Division is taken, to contact some of his hon. Friends who will not have heard the case so that the House may make it quite clear to the country that we mean business on this issue tonight.
The people of our country—and when I speak of "our country" I mean the whole of Great Britain—have made a great contribution to the world's history. In my view, if the House is to prove worthy of the new era in which we are living, it needs to adapt itself to the mid-twentieth century needs and ideas. If the House agrees by an overwhelming majority to the case which we propose to present, then, great as has been Britain's past, her future could be even greater.
The skill of our people, our accumulated knowledge, our scientific understanding and our progress in atomic energy and in electronics are the admiration of the world and especially of the

leading nations. The House needs to adapt itself to the atomic-automation age into which the world is moving very rapidly. That means that we must modernise the functioing of the House. If any hon. Member disagrees with me as I develop my argument, step by step, I hope that he will be good enough to say so, because I want to carry the whole House with me.
The prodigious spending in which the country is now involved and the manipulation of millions of pounds for which the House is responsible without Parliamentary scrutiny, make an organic weakness which needs urgent attention. Our hard-pressed people, now taxed more heavily than those in any other part of the world, need some relief. If the House is to be worthy of the country, it should take advantage of the opportunity now afforded to it to take action.
The Committee of Supply used to be, and still should be, an instrument of constructive criticism of administration. We have allowed our elected Parliament to be subordinated to the military hierarchy at Fontainebleau, to the General Staff in London, and to Departments which are responsible for spending and manipulating millions of pounds of our fellow countrymen's hard-earned money. Parliament has lost effective control of the country's finances. I ask the Select Committee to restore the Parliamentary effectiveness of financial scrutiny.
The country is spending £1,600 million a year. It is said that unless there is a fundamental change it will be spending £2,200 million within five years' time. The country cannot stand that kind of expenditure and it is time that the House asserted itself. I have been associated for many years with large-scale industry. Between the wars industry experienced many of the difficulties which the country is now experiencing. To hold their own against world competition those responsible had to estimate in shillings, not in thousands of pounds. In quoting for orders they had to respect a penalty clause and had to give a delivery date as well as a competitive price. I compared that with what is going on in this House, in the War Office, the Air Force and in the Navy, as I shall produce documentary evidence to prove later.
A few months ago I read in the Observer a review of Wheeler Bennett's book on the history of Germany. I immediately ordered it in the Library. Within a few days, because of the great service which we get from the Librarians, that book was in my possession. Here are one or two lessons from it.
The Germans stated that in Britain the military had always carried out the policy decided by the Cabinet and this House. In Britain, in the past—and this is the safeguard for our form of democracy—the military were subordinate to democracy. In Germany, however, it was the officer corps, the General Staff, who decided policy throughout their history, no matter what form of Government was in power.
We need to examine more closely all Estimates, all expenditure and administration. [HON. MEMBERS: "Hear, hear."] We are no longer dealing with thousands of pounds. We are now voting millions, for which every one of us is responsible. One of the duties of the House is not to vote money unless it is required. In the last financial year we voted millions of pounds that were not required. Nor should we agree to taxes unless they are required for public service.
I want to put this to hon. Members opposite, and I ask them not to take it personally. In all their Election speeches nearly every hon. Member gave an undertaking that, if returned, he would use his influence to reduce expenditure. That has not yet been done. Here is an opportunity for the House to assert itself and insist that this shall be done.
The Estimates should be subject to scrutiny by the House. Can anyone say that they are so at present? The present position in this respect is very unsatisfactory. If all the Departments knew that the Estimates were to be subjected to such careful scrutiny they would be more careful in their estimating. No Department should be allowed to play about with millions of pounds, as is the case at present. How can we have effective control over finance if the Estimates are not subject to Parliamentary scrutiny?
I put on record my views about the Treasury's misuse of virement. I have been very pleased to hear the observations made upon them by highly-placed

financial officials whose duty it is to advise the Government. I do not desire to repeat them tonight, but I hope that the Select Committee will consider the case which was made out.
Will the Select Committee compare the Treasury's Estimates and the Service Votes with the Civil Votes, especially in regard to education, old-age pensions and the needs of the poor? Will this Select Committee restore to the House of Commons its duties of scrutinising the Estimates and the expenditure? Will it examine and deal with the absolute power of the military spenders of millions of pounds? Will it deal with the need for estimating in pounds, and not allow millions of pounds to be played with?
I pay a tribute to the hon. Members of the House who make a great contribution to our administration by the service they render on the Select Committee on Estimates and the Select Committee on Public Accounts, and in other ways, and I pay tribute, too, to the officials whom we too often take for granted, and who do their best, in spite of the discouragement caused to them by the lack of scrutiny by the House of Government expenditure.
I quote the Fifth Report of the Select Committee on Estimates, dated 21st March:
The Directorate-General of Works is at present functioning under considerable handicaps … certain of the papers laid before them—
that is, the Committee—
showed a lack of precision and accuracy … In respect of the new Colonial Office, both the Estimates and the information supplied to the Comptroller and Auditor General, the Public Accounts Committee and Your Committee were unnecessarily inaccurate.
Is that satisfactory? "Lack of precision and accuracy." "Estimates unnecessarily inaccurate."
The Public Accounts Committee, in its First Report of the Session, 1955 to 1956, reported:
The Colonial Office stated that no attempt whatever is made to check the estimates submitted to them by Colonial Governments.
What an indictment of this House! What an indictment that is of our allowing this state of affairs. How dare this House acquiesce in the continuance of policies of this kind?
How many non. Members are aware of this? I quote the same Report again, this time on the Grant in Aid to Malaya:
Parliament was informed in the Estimates for 1951–52 that His Majesty's Government had agreed to a grant to the Federation Government of Malaya of a sum not exceeding £1,166,666 to meet the initial cost of raising two additional battalions (the 5th and 6th Battalions) of the Malay Regiment … This grant was issued in full in March, 1952 … the full cost of the initial equipment of the two battalions was only about £395,000. The overissue of £255,000 was recovered from Malaya in 1952–53.
In between, additional provision of £500,000 was made in the Estimates. We read that
… no proper accounts had been kept of the cost of raising the 5th and 6th Battalions, and settlement was eventually made on a certified statement of expenditure based on the cost of raising the 7th Battalion. This showed expenditure of £208,744. … Thus the net cost of the service was only £212,711 as compared with the original estimate of £1,166,666.
How dare this House acquiesce in such an unbusinesslike state of affairs as this? No accountant in private business who was responsible for this kind of thing would last many days in business. The House has acquiesced in this kind of thing for far too long, and it is time that the House asserted itself.
This indicates a scandalous state of affairs. I compare this treatment to that meted out to old-age pensioners, the unemployed, the injured, and so on. To the everlasting credit of the Select Committee on Public Accounts, it summed up in this way:
Your Committee were surprised to learn from the evidence given … that no attempt whatever is made by the Colonial Office to check the estimates submitted to them by Colonial Governments and that in the case in reference not even the sketchiest breakdown of the estimates was required.
How long has this been going on?—[An HON. MEMBER: "Too long."] Will the hon. Member stand up and repeat that? Will the hon. Member say who he was? If he will, I will go to his constituency and we will deal with the matter there. I do not mind genuine criticism or interjections, but I do object to that kind of sloppy attitude.
I now quote from the Civil Appropriation Accounts, which show that on

the Colonial Services Vote the surplus in 1950 was £8 million, in 1951 it was£½ million, in 1952 it was nearly £3 million, and in 1954 it was nearly £4 million. On the Colonial Development and Welfare Vote the surplus in 1950 was £6 million, in 1951 it was nearly £5½ million, in 1952 it was £1 million, and in 1953 it was £3 million. The Committee stated:
Your Committee are concerned at the size of the surpluses which have arisen on these two Votes over the last four years and recall the comments of the Committee of Session 1952–53 …
I compare this kind of treatment of the Colonial Office with the treatment of our local authorities and our hospitals where the "living angels" do such great service.
Had there been time I could have quoted the Ministry of Supply, showing similar surpluses and similar sloppy work. The same applies to the Ministry of Agriculture. These are people to whom this House allowed £74 million to play about with. The Armed Forces played about with surpluses of £135 million during the last year.
I submit that the time has arrived when the House should insist on many more hon. Members being put on this Committee. We should reinforce it with men of independent outlook, men who remain firmly anchored to their fundamental political ideas, men with great courage, so that the Committee can be made to face up to matters of this kind.
For example, will the Committee consider how the Atomic Energy Authority obtained financial autonomy? I do not make any reflection upon the scientists, to whom we all owe so much and who were trained in the same school of thought as myself. I know how these men have secured their positions on merit and, therefore, I make no reflection upon them, but there is something fundamentally wrong with the administration when it is able to play about with £178 million and this House is not given a report about it.
I come to the question of the personnel of the Select Committee. In my view, it should be more representative of the House. On this matter, perhaps I may have your guidance, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker: I think that the hon. Member is now anticipating the other Amendment. Let us deal with one at a time.

Mr. Ellis Smith: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Then that is the case that I present on this Amendment.
In spite of our little difference when I was provoked, I hope that hon. Members will excuse me. I wanted to make the case as quickly as possible. I plead with hon. Members now to be good enough to consider the reasoned case which has been put forward and to consult other hon. Members who are not present so that the House can send a message to the country making it clear that this democratic Assembly intends to assert itself tonight.

11.31 p.m.

Mr. George Cherwynd: I beg to second the Amendment.
The whole House will be deeply indebted to my hon. Friend the Member for Stoke-on-Trent, South (Mr. Ellis Smith) for raising this matter tonight. We all know the deep sincerity with which he speaks and how much he holds the House in esteem. All his actions and speeches are designed with the one purpose of making the House of Commons a really democratic, vigorous body.
I appeal to the Government to widen the terms of reference of the Select Committee. After all, what the Select. Committee decides will have an influence upon our procedure for the next ten or more years. It may be a considerable time before a Government feels able to set up another Select Committee to consider our procedure. Consequently, I hope that the present Government will give the Select Committee sufficient scope to cover all the points which hon Members would like considered.
I wish to raise a rather delicate matter concerning a practice which has developed during the last two or three years as a result of which we have become more or less first-class Members and second-class Members of the House. I always understood that we were all equal here, but it seems that now some are more equal than others, some having more privileges and rights.
I should like the Select Committee to be able to give some guidance in this

matter to Mr. Speaker, because he is placed in a most invidious position. What I have to say is in no way a reflection upon Mr. Speaker, for we understand the position he is in, which has grown up owing to the custom of the House in relation to the selection of certain hon. Members to speak in debates.
Perhaps it is useful that the Motion was postponed from yesterday, because we have today had a classic example of the very point I wish to make. We have had a debate on defence, a subject to which much thought and study has been given by many hon. Members. It is most important that the Government should know, in coming to its decision, what the House is thinking and feeling. Yet in the debate there were only eight speakers other than Front Bench speakers, and of the eight only two were back bench speakers, and one of those made a speech of well over 35 minutes' duration.
That is a complete outrage. It is almost an absolute scandal that so many hon. Members should be deprived of the opportunity to put forward their, ideas for consideration by the Government. The Secretary of State for War admitted and deplored the fact that so few hon. Members had been able to take part in the debate.
I am voicing the very strong feeling of back-bench hon. Members about the new phenomenon. In almost every debate we have a posse of Privy Councillors breaking their necks to speak. I would ask that the Select Committee should take into account that the practice which has grown up ought to be discouraged. If it cannot be discouraged by the restraint of the Privy Councillors, the Select Committee ought to be asked to recommend a rule which will enable Mr. Speaker to treat Privy Councillors in exactly the same way as other hon. Members. If that cannot be done, some of the Privy Councillors ought to practise self-denial now and then and let somebody else have a chance to speak. If they cannot, and feel that what they have to say is important, let them wait until someone else has got in rather than "jump the gun" and keep everybody else waiting about.
This custom is having a serious effect upon the outlook of hon. Members. When many of us came here first, in 1945, this


Chamber was crowded, for almost every debate of significance, with Members wanting to listen or to speak. Compare that with the state of the Chamber in the last few months when, even on major debates, there has been a sparse attendance. One of the reasons is that the abuse of their privilege by Privy Councillors is creating great frustration among other Members. An hon. Member who has much to do will not prepare a speech carefully if he knows that he has no chance of being called.
Today, everybody knew what the debating order would be. There was no question of catching Mr. Speaker's eye. We all knew, when we saw the right hon. Gentlemen sitting here, that they were going to get up and that because of the custom Mr. Speaker must accord priority to the Privy Councillors. I hope that the proposed Select Committee will have its powers widened to deal with this matter in a way that will help Mr. Speaker by relieving him of a very invidious task. The custom has led to a lack of interest among back benchers in the affairs of the House, and that is bad for Parliament and for the country. It is tending to kill what has always been a vigorous, live debating Assembly.
When I came here, in 1945, I wondered whether I should be here now, and I wonder now whether I shall be here in eleven years' time and whether we shall be conducting our affairs in precisely the same way. Very little has changed in the conduct of debates since 1945, while everything else has changed in the world outside. When the world is becoming used to speeding up, to automation and the rest of it, it seems out-of-date and obsolete that we should be lagging behind.
I hope that the Select Committee will have power to look at our voting arrangements in this House. It is strange that we should spend so much time over our inefficient way of conducting Divisions. Why cannot the tellers go to the doors immediately, and so knock three or four minutes off the Division time, even if the Division is called off? All that would be needed then would be to tear up the paper of names. Why have we to wait in the Lobby for two or three minutes for the tellers, and then all go through? This little matter could be put right.
There is the major question about the Sittings of the House. Here we are, at almost twelve o'clock at night, debating this matter, at a time when most people are in bed, if they have any sense. I do not know when we shall finish it. That is because we start our proceedings at half-past two in the afternon instead of at some time in the morning. I know the difficulties of Ministers in their Departments, but the Select Committee, considering the matter for ten years ahead, should have power to look into this matter. Why should we not meet in the morning and finish in the evening at a reasonable time? We could have one day devoted to Standing Committees the whole time.
I hope that we shall not be left with this Select Committee as proposed. It is not representative of the House. The main test that the Select Committee should apply is: can we make our House of Commons what it should be, a live and vigorous assembly? Can we keep up to date? Can we keep our Members fresh so that they can give their best to the service of this House? It is my belief that this Motion, valuable as it is on these small technical points, ought to be widened to allow those consideration to be dealt with.

11.40 p.m.

Viscount Hinchingbrooke: The hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent, South (Mr. Ellis Smith) sometimes speaks as if Armageddon were going to burst upon the world before he had the chance of cracking his breakfast egg. But tonight he caught the conscience of the House in what he said about the lack of scrutiny of Government expenditure. We on this side have some sympathy with what he said. We are inclined to the view that debates in Committee of Supply tend to become stylised, and that some reform should be achieved.
The hon. Member for Stockton-on-Tees (Mr. Chetwynd) wondered what would happen to him in eleven years. He will probably be a Privy Councillor, sitting on the Front Bench opposite. He had some interesting things to say which I should perhaps allude to when I come to them later, but I do not intend, at this late hour, to make a long speech.
I think that the Government have approached this matter in the wrong way. In 1945, the Government of the day sought to appoint a Select Committee on Procedure and Public Business without qualification except that they reserved the right to forward a memorandum to that Committee which they then proceeded to do, but by so doing they enabled the Committee to discuss matters other than the subject matter of the Government's memorandum.
At this time we are, unfortunately, confronted with exact directions as to what this Select Committee on Procedure has to do, and there is no provision whatever in the Motion for the Select Committee proceeding to do other business, to generate its own ideas, to seek the advice of other parties and persons in the House who have, as hon. Members have shown, considerable ideas to ventilate. There are outside authorities who have also got views on the future work of Parliament which ought to be considered.
It is almost ten years since the last Select Committee sat on this subject. It was appointed in 1945. It sat through 1946 and it reported in 1947. Today, we are in 1956. The Ernest Brown Committee was appointed in 1931, so that if we exclude the war years we have a kind of ten-year interval, which is appropriate, and I do not see why the Government have been so shy about this business. I know that the Leader of the Opposition assented to the view that there ought to be a limited discretion given to the Committee, but I ventured to write to him upon the subject and I received an answer from him rather withdrawing from the view that he took in the House.
I think that probably the Opposition Front Bench would be in agreement with the idea that this Select Committee should, when it has dealt with these priority subjects, proceed to ask for its reappointment in the next Session in order that some of these wider topics can be considered. I very much hope that that is what the Select Committee will do, that it will ask for its reappointment to consider subsequent matters.
I do not want to argue now the kind of subjects to which I think the Select Committee should give its attention. I merely state them baldly so as to get

them on record, in the knowledge that they are very controversial. To argue them and to try to convince the House to accept them now would take a very long time and, after all, it is a matter for the Select Committee and not for this House today.
Many hon. Members on this side of the House have given some thought to these matters in the last few years and have come to the conclusion that certain things should be done. The first is that the suspension of the rule, when required, should not be moved until 10 p.m. Secondly, the Closure should be able to be carried by a simple majority without any special quorum. Thirdly, the time allowed for a count should be increased. Fourthly, to take up a suggestion of the hon. Member for Stockton-on-Tees, tentative explorations into voting procedure should be considered, and we should not neglect the successes and the failures of the French Parliament in proxy voting. Fifthly, a Select Committee should be set up on the lines of that proposed by Lord Campion in a very famous memorandum which is almost a State document, thoroughly considered and agreed to by the last Select Committee on Public Expenditure in 1946, with ramifying Sub-Committees which would largely do the work that the hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent, South has in mind.
Finally, the great majority of Bills, except the Finance Bill, should be sent upstairs to Standing Committees in, accordance with Standing Order No. 38 and standing order No. 10, permitting the House to adjourn in order to facilitate the work of Standing Committees in the afternoon and evening, should be invoked on at least one day a week.
There are, I must admit, a number of hon. Members on this side of the House who favour an even more drastic step than that in view of the fact that so many of the Clauses in Bills are of no greater importance than the Stautory Instruments which we debate within a fixed time limit and can only reject or accept and cannot amend. It is suggested that a Sessional Business Committee should be appointed to apply the Guillotine procedure to all Bills on the Floor of the House except constitutional Bills, classified as such by direction of Mr. Speaker.
Those are highly controversial questions which I am not trying to persuade the House to look at tonight, but they ought to be considered after an interval of ten years by the Select Committee on Procedure. I very much hope that there will be unanimity on that Committee when it has done its official work, and quite proper work, on priority matters, and that it should ask for its reappointment for this wider purpose at a later stage.

11.47 p.m.

Mr. Denis Howell: I want to endorse what has been said from the benches behind me, particularly in view of the scandalous debate which the House witnessed this afternoon. It was an utter disgrace that in a debate of that importance only two back benchers should be able to get into the debate throughout the whole day.
The arguments have been very properly deployed and advanced, and I do not want to repeat them. I think that that would be wrong at this hour of the night. We do not delude ourselves, especially we new Members, that people take much notice of us, but it ought to be strongly represented to the Government and Opposition leaders that there is very considerable feeling about these matters. Although Privy Councillors and ex-Ministers are important people and you have said, Mr. Speaker, that the House accepts that they have experience and a point of view which should be heard, Privy Councillors represent only 40,000 or 50,000 people each, the same as the rest of us. The essential fact is that the constituents of the newest Member are as entitled to be heard as those of the oldest Member or any Privy Councillor.
As my hon. Friend the Member for Stockton-on-Tees (Mr. Chetwynd) said, many new Members have come into the House. It was insulting them this afternoon. They have got into a frame of mind in which they ask, "Why should I bother to prepare a speech? I know there is no hope at all of getting in on a major debate." That is a deplorable frame of mind for hon. Members to have, but we know that it exists and that the only opportunity open to Members,

especially new Members, to raise matters in the House is to ask a Question dealing with a specific and narrow matter, to ballot for the Adjournment or to come to the House on a Friday.
There are many things which the Committee ought to consider, and I hope that the Government will agree to an extension of its terms of reference. I would not have the temerity to suggest that I know the answers, but I suggest that there is a problem which should be thoroughly examined. Twelve months ago, in the last Recess, some of my colleagues and myself visited some mental hospitals in this country. We found that a scandalous state of affairs existed, but we have been unable to debate that scandalous state of affairs in mental hospitals in the Midlands from that day to this.
We have put down one or two Questions which only touched the fringe of the matter and we have been able to see the Minister. I must say that he met us with great courtesy and spent some time with us; we have no complaints to make about him personally. But this is a matter which affects the people of the Midlands and, indeed, of the country generally, and we are entitled to have it thrashed out in the light of day. It is not good enough, when we have to deal with these matters, to feel all the time that we might be giving away a confidence which the Minister gave us in a private meeting at which he was good enough to meet us.
Another question concerns Private Bills upstairs. The Birmingham Corporation had a Bill upstairs, which sought to permit the Corporation to grant free travel facilities. West Bromwich, and either Walsall or Wolverhampton, had a similar Bill. The Private Bill Committee of this House agreed unanimously that those Bills should go forward, but they were all turned down by the Private Bill Committee of another place. Some of us feel very strongly about it and think that it ought to be debated.

Mr. Speaker: Order. The hon. Member is dealing with the Committee of another place. This Committee can deal only with this place.

Mr. Howell: I am sorry if I have trespassed against the rules of order. The point I was making was that we ought to


have an opportunity in the House of Commons to discuss the reasons that the Bills have not proceeded further. I will not pursue the point. I believe that these matters warrant earnest consideration.
As a new Member, I rise merely to point out that we have had some discussions on the question today and that the unanimous view of new Members is that the procedure of putting Bills into Committee upstairs ought to be examined more thoroughly. I can see no reason at all why the Restrictive Trade Practices Bill occupied so many months in this Chamber. It ought to have been sent upstairs, leaving much more time here to discuss money issues and points of principle concerning the National Health Service.
These are vital matters. We appreciate, Mr. Speaker, that you are getting into the position in debates, through no fault of your own, in which a batting order might well be issued, as is done in another place, because we know very well who will speak in any debate. The phrase "Catching Mr. Speaker's eye" is rapidly becoming meaningless.
I associate myself entirely with what my hon. Friend said and I hope that some notice will be taken of it at an early date.

11.55 p.m.

Sir Frank Medlicott: I listened to this debate mainly because I have a great respect for the hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent, South (Mr. Ellis Smith). Although I do not always agree with what he says, his speeches are based upon such a sense of integrity and of loyalty to this House that they are always worth listening to. Something that he said prompts me to add a word or two of my own.
I cannot see my way to supporting what the hon. Gentleman said in the Division Lobby, because it seems to me that the Committee which is to be appointed has been charged with certain fairly urgent tasks. Its terms of reference have been very carefully drawn so as to concentrate its attention upon those tasks. It seems to me that if an attempt were made to widen the scope of the work of the Committee in the way suggested in the Amendment, the Committee would fall between two stools. It would have to

go over such a wide range of subjects that its deliberations would take a very long time and some of the very urgent tasks referred to in its terms of reference would not be considered with proper promptitude.
Nevertheless, what has been said tonight makes it clear that there are a number of matters connected with our procedure which need attention, and I hope that the larger survey is something which will not be indefinitely postponed. I propose to refer to only two examples of the very many which have been brought to our attention tonight.
The noble Lord the Member for Dorset, South (Viscount Hinchingbrooke) referred, for example, to the question of the proxy vote. I believe that we should regard that as a very considerable departure and as a somewhat casual way of recording our votes on grave issues. But I venture to suggest that nothing could be more casual than the way in which we vote under existing circumstances. We are often fetched from remote recesses of this building where we are engaged in something quite different from the subject matter under discussion.
The question one most frequently hears on those occasions is, "What are we voting on?" That seems to me to be a most casual method of voting. That example only shows that proxy voting, though it may not be suitable to our proceedings, has advantages which do not exist under present arrangements.
The only other point to which I wish to refer is one which has been given much thought in this debate. It is the amount of time taken up by the right hon. Gentlemen who have begun to enjoy this precedence among us which has been so well described as the creating of first-class and second-class Members. The hon. Member for Birmingham, All Saints (Mr. D. Howell) referred to himself as a new Member. Perhaps it may help if I recall that in the eighteen years during Which I have been privileged to be here I do not recall there ever having been so many Privy Councillors in our midst as at the present time. Perhaps, in the olden days, they were not as energetic and were more inclined to rest on their laurels or to seek the quietude and dignity of another place.
However, the fact remains that there are now so many active Privy Councillors in our midst that it makes the matter of catching Mr. Speaker's eye one of very great difficulty. There is a great tendency for other hon. Members to give up any hope of being called. Of course, there is not a single Privy Councillor whom we would not wish to have with us. We rejoice in their presence and in their contributions to our deliberations. It may well be that it is purely accidental that at present they are more numerous than they used to be. But if it should transpire that this preponderance of Members entitled to precedence in debate is to become a continuing feature of our Legislature it is quite obviously something to which consideration should be given.
These are only two of the several valuable points brought to our notice by the hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent. South, who has performed a most valuable service in bringing this subject to our attention. Although I could not see my way to support the Amendment, I hope that the day will not be far distant when we shall be able to give our undivided attention, as a House, to the vital matter which the hon. Member has brought before us.

12.1 a.m.

Mr. Wedgwood Benn: This is a very pleasant debate, because it is one which raises a genuine House of Commons matter. It is a particular pleasure to me to be following in debate the hon. Member for Norfolk, Central (Sir F. Medlicott), because I believe that I have found the answer to both of his difficulties. He will see from the Report of the Select Committee on Procedure, 1945, that the difficulty which he has mentioned was dealt with by the very simple method of making it an instruction to that Committee that it should report as soon as possible on any scheme for the acceleration of proceedings on Public Bills. Therefore, nothing that I or any of my hon. Friends say will prevent the Committee dealing with these matters, since they are matters of importance, as we know from the experience of the last two years.
On the second question of the Privy Councillors, I suspect that those who have spoken in this debate about Privy

Councillors have touched on the reason why the Government are not willing to accept the Amendment. I suspect that the Government, and possibly my right hon. Friends on the Opposition Front Bench, are rather frightened of this Privy Councillors question coming up, and that is why the Committee is limited in its terms of reference. This is only a suspicion. I hope that I am wrong. Even if I am right, the remedy lies in our own hands.

Mr. Glenvil Hall: My hon. Friend said that he hoped he was wrong. I assure him that he is.

Mr. Benn: I am delighted to hear it. May I point out to my hon. Friends that there is a remedy to this problem if they choose to take it? The practice of the House may be altered by Resolution. A Friday Resolution is as good as any other, and if an hon. Member wins the Ballot for a Friday and chooses to persuade back benchers to come along—on the assumption that Privy Councillors will be against a change and we back benchers are for it—he will carry the day. I am not saying this in support of or in opposition to such a proposal. I am saying this only to those who perhaps have not thought that one can do good works on a Friday.

Mr. Chetwynd: If all right hon. Members turn up and stand up to speak, no private Member can take part in the debate.

Mr. Benn: My hon. Friend shows little of his experience of eleven years in the House. He must know that the vote very often goes against the weight of the argument. That has often been the case since 1951. Even if the whole of a Friday were occupied by Privy Councillors, the vote at the end could be resoundingly the other way, and they would see for themselves that silence is often as strong as words.
This, at any rate, is a vital subject. I wish, first, to protest against the lateness of the hour at which it is being discussed. I will be brief and will try not to say anything that is unnecessary, but I do not propose to restrict—and I hope that hon. Members will also not restrict—what are sincerely believed views on important matters simply because we have


come to this subject just after ten o'clock instead of at 3.30 in the afternoon.
I suspect that the two Front Benches are in agreement in limiting the terms of reference. Now, there are people who take the view that if both Front Benches agree it must be right. I am a back bencher and I take the opposite view, the view that if both Front Benches are in agreement, something very fishy is going on. If the Chaplain to this House were to begin prayers every afternoon with a Litany for back benchers, I think it might run:
From Privy Councillors, from Closures, from the crafts and assaults of the Patronage Secretary, and from all things that go through on the nod. Good Lord Privy Seal deliver us.
I believe that this question of the procedure of the House makes no sense unless we look at it in the circumstances of our times. Those hon. Members who have taken the trouble to read Lord Campion's book, "The Introduction to the Procedure of the House of Commons," will see that he divides the history of procedure into four periods, and they are periods which fall naturally into their different parts because of the functions of the House of Commons in the state of the nation at those particular times.
The first period is up to 1547, when the House was fighting to establish its right to share in the legislation; and the procedure of the House which developed was that which was necessary to get that right established.
He then takes us to the year 1660, when it was the House of Commons versus the King and when the forms and rules of debate were formulated.
The third period was 1660–1832, when it became increasingly a battle between Government and Opposition, and financial control was first settled.
Finally, he gives the year 1832 and then leaves a dash, like the unfinished tombstone, and describes the battle between the House and the pressure of public business. I want to put a final date on that tombstone—1832–1945—and to suggest that we have entered into a new period, with new problems for the House. If we are to make sense of the procedure, I think we must now relate it to the new circumstances. What shall we see in the new period, 1945-? What

has it brought for us in this House? I want, as far as I can, to describe rather than criticise at this stage. It has brought a far greater area of responsibility. The House is responsible for far more things than before 1945, things that touch the rights of the individual, and the Government have recognised the necessity of reviewing this by setting up the Franks Committee. Now a new Select Committee is to be set up to consider the rôle of the House in relation to all this.
There is now, and has been since the last Election, promise of reform of the House of Lords—not unconnected with the change in the circumstances of our time. If we look at procedure afresh we must do so with the background of the greater area of public responsibility. The characteristic of this 1945 period is the fact that the Government, and I do not blame them, have increasingly operated through the prerogative power, delegated legislation or the Statutory Instrument. They have made their rules outside the House and we have only had a nibble at them later on. This is something of which the House must become more fully conscious; we must try to see whether we cannot review this procedure and fit it in better with our undoubted right to criticise.
There is a third great change. One can find no mention of it in the Standing Orders. This is the growth of the party structure, and the fact that we as individual Members are gravely affected by the decisions of our party committees, and our Whips, none of whom find any mention in Erskine May. For how long are we to be satisfied to run a machine according to rules which do not mention the realities of the daily life of Members? I am not complaining; it is because Parliament has the H-bomb weapon, the right to dismiss a Government, because such great power is in the hands of hon. Members, that checks and controls have to be established to see that power is not misused.
Fourthly—and this change is difficult to describe—there is a steady weakening of the criticism by back benchers of the work of the Government. This is not an attack on hon. Members. It is a situation in which we are all concerned, however hard we try to do our job well. Complexity of public affairs is greater,


it is much harder to know what Departments are doing to keep up with what is going on, and to direct our criticism accurately and well. Indeed, it is very difficult when the Government—and the times in which we live perhaps, we may say—dictate the reduction in the amount of information made available to the House.
I do not want to get into difficult topics such as that of public security, but I think that every conscientious Member must be anxious every time he hears a Minister say, "I cannot answer that question." No back bencher should be satisfied by such an answer, without feeling that something should be done about it.
The fifth characteristic of the period in which we live and work is, I believe, the diminution of the status and importance of Parliament and Members of Parliament. It is, perhaps, impertinent of me, a relatively new Member, to say so, but I believe, and frankly confess, that, for a number of reasons, some of which I have mentioned and some of which I have not, there is a weakness in the power of the House of Commons as Against the Government, and I think, also, that it is not unconnected with the conditions in which we have to live and work in this Palace which, in my view, are monstrous.
What can we do about it? Some may say at this time, "Change our constitution. Introduce the French system of committees or the system current in the United States of America." I do not take that view, because whenever one looks with envy on the investigating Congressman or the irresponsible French Deputy, one has one comfort: we can dismiss our Government; neither of them can do that. I would not change that, but I do think that what we have to try to do is to see that this House becomes more than a foghorn in the ship of State, with the final right to scuttle the ship if it thinks that the captain is steering the wrong course. Then Parliament simply becomes a safety valve.
Therefore, in the proposals I want to make tonight I shall try to keep that system of Government which we accept, that is to say, a system of Cabinet Government which has to retain the confidence of the House which, in turn,

allows the Government to get their business on the same condition.
There are four basic rights every one of which we ought to insist upon: first, the right to be told and to be consulted; secondly, the right to examine and to criticise; thirdly, the right to redress grievances; and, fourthly, the right of decision. I take them brieflly one by one, and show to what extent the House under the present procedure seems to me to fail in its operation.
First, the right to be told and to be consulted. I hope that my right hon. Friends and my hon. Friends will not think it wrong of me to say this, but the more I think of the circumstances in which the atomic bomb was made in this country the more appalled I become. To think that this House could gaily go about its business, pursuing the fancies of its procedure, the little tributes to Mr. Speaker and the Mace, the little habits and courtesies, while the main issue of the twentieth century was being decided without its knowledge, and with money for which it was responsible, seems to me to be absolutely shocking.
I am not saying that there are not circumstances in which it is right to withhold from the House information on grounds of security. Of course I am not saying that, but I say that there must be a simple test which should be applied in these cases, that no Minister who wishes to withhold information from the House can do so without the consent of Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker is, after all, our guardian. He is the man who, in the past, has defended our rights against the King. The King came here and there was the famous protest of Mr. Speaker Lenthall, "May it please Your Majesty, I have neither eyes to see nor ears to hear in this House except as the House doth direct." That famous protest finds no echo in our modern battle with the Executive. Is the House to allow the Government to withhold information from us without any sort of protest? I believe that there are legislative precedents which would enable the Speaker to protect us.
I give a very minor example which is one which I happen to remember from a few years back. It is that of the Marine War Risks Insurance Act, under which the Government set up machinery to


underwrite the insurance market in the event of war. The Act said that the Government should publish the accounts every year, but it also said that if it was against the public security for the Government to publish the accounts then a Speaker's certificate must be issued. That is absolutely right. That is what we ought to be after. That is how we need to protect ourselves against the encroachments of the Executive without sacrificing anything of the security of the realm.
Another very good example is the protection which this House has from another place under the Parliament Act. It requires only a certificate from Mr. Speaker, but it does require a certificate from Mr. Speaker, for us to bring into operation one of the great constitutional Measures of this country which does finally maintain the supremacy of this House over another place.
These are the main issues. The right to be told and to be consulted must be reviewed in the light of modern circumstances. There are many other minor points which I could mention, but I will not inflict them on the House except just to describe them, without in any way justifying my view. For instance, Private Notice Questions, which, I believe, are now gravely abused. Anyone with a minor disaster in his constituency can get one, but really big issues are very often not allowed. I am not criticising Mr. Speaker in his choice, but only the procedure which allows this to happen.
Ministerial statements: the right to be told by the Minister straight away is a very important right, but what a muddle we get ourselves into at half-past three of an afternoon when a long and important statement is made. There are a lot of questions, even if they are from back benchers and not from Privy Councillors, and Mr. Speaker says, "I would remind the House that there is no Question before the House." Either we should not have a little examination of a Ministerial statement or, if we do, we should have it on a proper basis. I see no reason why what I understand was the old practice of moving the Adjournment for half an hour should not be followed to allow immediate consideration of matters of great importance.
The second right that I mentioned was the right to examine and criticise. I must mention, in this connection, a suggestion

which I have never heard advanced before, though no ideas are new ones, and that is that we could adopt the system which is followed in the United States Congress, where a member may have his speech printed in the Official Report without being able to deliver it. I mention this because of the fact that under the party system which we have, and under the grave pressure of time which operates against all hon. Members, it is not always possible for one's views to get on record on matters of great importance.
It does not normally matter, but there are certain occasions, particularly when one is quite conscientiously voting against one's conscience for reasons of party loyalty, when one would like to be able to set down in HANSARD one's reasons for dissenting from the majority view. I think that that is worth considering. I doubt whether it would be abused. It would be a great sweat for hon. Members to write little bits to put in HANSARD and they would still have to pay the postage to send HANSARD to their constituents; but I think that it would enable hon. Members to put forwards expressions of view.
Then, again, there are Statutory Instruments. I am far from satisfied. I entirely agree with my hon. Friend the Member for Stoke-on-Trent, South (Mr. Ellis Smith), who spoke about the rôle of Select Committees in considering Government expenditure. I propose to say nothing about financial procedure, because that has been brilliantly covered by my hon. Friend, with the assent of the whole House. I am far from satisfied that we should allow the complete abandonment of detailed examination of the Estimates to go by year after year without protest.
I should like to see greater use made of Committees, not just to examine work of individual Departments, for I fear lest we get a Departmental mind extending, by infection, to Members of those Committees. I do not want to see that, but I should like to see a greater use made of Committees of this House for things which at the moment are too often given to Royal Commissions, Departmental inquiries or outside bodies collected together for the purpose of the inquiry and who then disperse while their Reports rot in the Library of the House.
The right to redress grievances is one which has almost completely disappeared from the procedure of the House. Hon. Members should just consider the truncated form or survival of the Petition procedure to realise what has actually happened. An hon. Member puts the Petition in the bag and it is quietly forgotten. If he wants half an inch of space in his local paper he reads some of it out, or if he wants an inch and a half in his local paper he insists, under the Standing Order, upon the Clerk of the House reading it out, and then he walks up, pops it in the bag, and then it is quietly forgotten.
In days when there are so many grievances against Government Departments it is scandalous that Members of Parliament, in seeking to put these grievances right, should be entirely dependent either on the grace and favour of Ministers—I make no complaints about Ministers; their job is to defend their Departments—or on the ultimate weapon of voting against the Government, which is ridiculous in consideration of matters of this kind.
Why cannot the House use the legislative authority and the authority of the House to examine certain grievances referred to it by hon. Members? Why should we allow a Department to decide, after a polite letter or an interview, whether there will be an inquiry into the circumstances at the hospital where old Mrs. Jones dies after having a treble injection of penicillin when she should have been given two aspirins? That sort of thing occurs, and hon. Members feel powerless except to put down a Question and say they will raise the matter on the Adjournment, and then they let it go, forwarding the carbon copy of the Minister's letter on to their constituent. We have the power here if only we will use it, and we can do it without disturbing the comfortable majority of the Government which gives the Cabinet its peaceful weekend sleep. I wish the House would seriously concern its mind with it.
Finally, there is the right to decide. I am not one of those who believe, as the Liberals do, that a free vote is the answer to all our problems. Incidentally, I wonder where our Liberal hon. Friends are when an issue of this kind is being debated. The Liberal approach that the idea of a free vote is better than anything

else does not stand up to examination. I once heard a Division Lobby defined as a place where one can meet half the Liberal Party at any given time.
However, it remains true that the vote of confidence is used too much in this House. It particularly applies to Government back benchers, because on them rests the majority of the Government. There is too great a reliance on the vote of confidence, and there ought to be more occasions when the free vote is allowed. If I am asked to give one example, tonight is that example. Here is an example of a House of Commons matter where, if we get our big Select Committee and the Government's Select Committee is pushed out of the window, no one will say that the Prime Minister should resign or that there should be a new Home Secretary.
This is a matter for the House to decide. I should like to see—it is not a matter which one can define or lay down in a Standing Order—the "free vote approach" becoming a little more popular in the office of the Patronage Secretary and the Leader of the House. I think that, given co-operation and goodwill, it should be possible to sustain a few defeats and actually enhance the reputation of the Government, although perhaps in the year of the Death Penalty (Abolition) Bill it may be a little difficult to get that view accepted on the other side of the House.
The Home Secretary said that we have had Committees recently and we should not look at the matter again so soon. I will read out the dates of the last 13 Committees to show the House that ten years is the normal period. The dates are: 1837, 1848, 1854, 1861, 1869, 1871, 1878, 1886, 1890, 1906, 1913, 1932 and 1945. There is a very good precedent, if we are going to be conservative in looking, for our precedents for having a full review now. The last one was the Select Committee which closed a period; this is the one which should open the new period of procedure of which I have been speaking.
I want to end by saying just one word about whether this is really such a revolutionary idea or not. I am a traditionalist about the House. I love the procedure of the House. When Black Rod is locked out on his way from another place, I feel rather proud. When


the Clerk of the House rises at the beginning of a new Session and says "Outlawries," I am very glad to think that we should remember that we are doing business more important than the Queen's business. But what value are these little habits if they are not reflecting the true situation between the Commons and the Executive? What is the use of reducing by £10 the salary of the Secretary of State for War when he is quietly spending £100 million without even telling us?
There is a danger of this House becoming rather quaint and rather cute, becoming the sort of thing more famous through the posters of the British Travel and Holidays Association in the United States and elsewhere than of real constitutional importance. It is because I believe that this House has a real part to play, and must play it, that I believe that we should review again our procedure, in the light of the circumstances of our time. Then this House will command the loyalty and affection of future generations of Members, just as it has commended the loyalty and affection of this one, including my own.

12.26 a.m.

Major Lloyd-George: Perhaps the House would wish me to say a word or two now on the debate. Owing to circumstances entirely out of my control, I am sailing in unaccustomed waters. I am not sure that this is not my maiden speech on this subject. I think it would be out of order to discuss the matters referred to the Select Committee. That is probably why we have discussed everything but those referred subjects.
We have had a very interesting debate. I make no complaints about anything I have heard, although I have heard a good deal of it before in the very many years I have been in this House. I heard about the unfair distribution of speakers not for the first time. Many a time I have gone home with the greatest speech I had ever been prepared to deliver. That is a thing which will not be easily remedied. The complaint has been going on for a long time, and I have great sympathy with it. In common with many other hon. Gentlemen, I spent a good many years on the back benches. Whether the suggestion of the hon. Member for Bristol, South-East (Mr. Benn) that we might send our speeches to the Press

would help, I do not know. I do not want to offend anybody in any quarter, and I would not altogether reject the idea on occasions. I am not sure that it would be a remedy for our difficulties.
We have heard again of the inefficient methods of our voting. Many people say that we ought to copy some of the Continental ideas, such as pressing buttons. I think the hon. Member will find, on reflection, that the system of voting in this House is based on very sound ideas. We have all seen scenes in this House; a Division has been an excellent way of getting the atmosphere a good deal calmer. Complaints about the times of sitting of the House are not new. It is a difficult matter because of Committees and the other work that Members have to do.
The hon. Member for Bristol, South-East referred to changes and weaknesses in the present system, including the steady weakening of the power of criticism that back benchers could direct against the Government. Speaking as one who answers a good many Questions in this House, I have not noticed any weakening of the power of back benchers so far as Questions are concerned. They have, on that occasion, a very good opportunity.
Because we have had many examinations by Select Committees appointed by various parties we do not say that we do not propose to have any more. On the contrary, we are very glad to listen to the kind of debate that we have had tonight. It would not be right to have too frequent examinations into the general question of the procedure of the House. It is very easy, as we have heard tonight, to make a case of the weaknesses and the need to have a general inquiry, but I doubt very much whether it is in the best interests of the House to have these general inquiries too frequently. The reason that we deliberately put down these four particular items for examination by the Select Committee has been that we thought, and I think rightly, that those four items were matters of the greatest urgency in the minds of hon. Members in all quarters of the House. I am fortified in that by what the Leader of the Opposition himself said. He also agreed that it would not be good after six or seven years to have another general inquiry, and I think that on reflection that would be the general opinion.
The hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent, South (Mr. Ellis Smith), who moved this Amendment in a very eloquent speech, made one or two comments with regard to finance generally. He said that we are now in the midst of the twentieth century and that there was considerable expenditure which did not get properly scrutinised by the House. I am in some little difficulty about this. I agree with him that it is of vital importance in view of the enormous amount of the expenditure, but let me remind the House of what hon. Members already know—though I think we should all be reminded—that the Select Committee on Estimates is empowered to examine any or all of the Estimates presented to the House. That is what they call current examination.
Then we have the Select Committee on Public Accounts, which is empowered to examine any or all of the accounts presented to the House—what one might call a kind of audit—and the Committee is assisted by the Comptroller and Auditor General, an official of the House and not of the Government.
I know the hon. Gentleman did not mean this, but, if I may say so, his argument almost amounted to saying that the Committee itself was not doing the job effectively. But whether he meant that or not, I do not think that the setting up of another Committee would make the position any better. To give one idea of some of the difficulties that we were confronted with in this scrutiny, in the Civil Estimates alone there are more than 1,000 pages of print. The House of Commons sitting as a House could not possibly subject all this mass of figures to the kind of scrutiny which I think the hon. Gentleman had in mind. That is a reason why the House sets up during each Session an Estimates Committee.
That Committee has the power to call witnesses, to scrutinise the Estimates, including the atomic energy Vote, to which the hon. Gentleman referred, and all the defence Estimates, and to report to the House. I am not saying that that is a perfect machine, but I was trying to point out one or two of the difficulties if we were to try to do what the hon. Gentleman suggested and if the House as a whole were to attempt to scrutinise all these items in the way that I fancy he

suggested. I hope that we can confine it to the four items to which I have referred, which are of very great importance and which have been pressed on many occasions from all sides of the House.
The hon. Member for Bristol, South-East referred to Committees which have been appointed before, and I did so in my original speech tonight—the Committees in 1914, in 1930–31 and in 1945. The major recommendations of the Committee appointed in 1945 were implemented in 1947. Whilst I realise that there are many things which hon. Members in all parts of the House want to see remedied, I hope they will allow the Committee to proceed with the four I have mentioned. It is a matter of great urgency. Of course, we shall consider what has been said in the debate tonight.

12.35 a.m.

Mr. G. R. Mitchison: I think I ought to make quite clear to the House that the three points that the Government suggested the Select Committee should inquire into were put to the Opposition and my right hon. Friends, having given the matter careful consideration, only made the one further suggestion which the right hon. and gallant Gentleman mentioned at the beginning of this debate. I repeat that, after having given the matter very careful consideration, we took the view that it was right at the moment to have a limited inquiry with that one addition to the suggested terms of reference. It is, therefore, correct to say that we have been consulted about the matter and that the Motion put before the House now represents the result of that consultation.
Having said that, I should like to add that this, of course, is a House of Commons matter. I am sure I am not the only hon. Member who has sat listening to the debate tonight and finding it not only interesting but also interesting by its variety. I hope my hon. Friends will allow me to say that what I thought respectfully were excellent speeches I found even better because they did approach the matter from different standpoints with a like sincerity and a freshness which I thought—I am sure the right hon. and gallant Gentlemen would agree—was really stimulating. No doubt some of us had made those points before, but


they were put together and made a complete whole. They presented to the House and to the Government a bundle of matters which really ought to be taken into careful consideration.
It is not merely a question of keeping the procedure of the House efficient or anything of that sort. As my hon. Friends have pointed out in different ways, it is a question of adapting that procedure to the changing circumstances of our time and the consequent changes in the functions, the duties and the character of this House itself. That really is the substance of the matter. As I see it, the terms of reference now proposed for this Select Committee do not go nearly as far as that. They perhaps deal with some specific difficulties and some specific doubts. I am bound to say that that at least has the advantage of getting these matters dealt with, we hope, tolerably promptly. If the field were to be wider the delay would be greater.
I was very glad indeed to understand from the right hon. and gallant Gentleman—I hope he will correct me if I am misinterpreting him in any way—that he regarded the appointment of this Select Committee for a special purpose as without prejudice one way or another to a more comprehensive review when the moment arrives. Although from this bench I am reluctant to give too much to the Government of the day, I think they have a responsibility to the House just as the House has its own rights in the matter. They have a responsibility from time to time to consider relations between the Executive and the House and to move in matters of this sort. If one Government do not do it, another may, as occasion arises.
I therefore hope that my hon. Friends will feel able to accept what I agree is a much more limited proposition than that which they have in mind as something good in itself for the moment and something which should not prejudice any fuller review when, on a true view of the matter, the time for that comes.

12.41 a.m.

Mr. Stephen Swingler: I am sorry to prolong the debate, but we have had an utterly complacent speech from the Home Secretary, and I do not think we are able to accept the guidance of my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Kettering (Mr.

Mitchison) about the limited proposition. It is a question whether the limited proposition is the correct one, and our feeling is that whilst we might be prepared to accept a limited proposition, we should insist that the priorities must be right—and we do not regard them as right in this Motion.
I do not wish to go into the general case which has been made by my hon. Friends and into their general proposition about procedure. I am concerned about the two opening sentences of the Motion, because I think that the Government have been misled in this matter and that they will very seriously waste the time of the Select Committee and of Parliament if they allow the terms of the Motion to be so narrowly drawn. I will confine myself narrowly to this point in view of the fact that my hon. Friends have made the general case about the priorities of procedural reform which ought to be considered, but I should like to draw attention to a Ruling which was given by Mr. Speaker himself on 11th March, 1954. It seems to me a little peculiar that both the Government and, apparently, the leaders of the Opposition have completely disregarded the fact that on that date Mr. Speaker gave in the House a most important Ruling arising out of the Standing Orders which were made on Service Estimates debates in 1948.
The Home Secretary has tonight made some play of the fact that there was a Committee on procedure in 1945 which led to certain new procedural rules. Some of us, particularly in debates on Service Estimates, have had experience of the working of those rules—both the advantages and some of the disadvantages to hon. Members. Some hon. Members know that in the course of debates on the Service Estimates in 1952, 1953 and 1954 we had a certain battle on a question of procedure. You, Mr. Deputy-Speaker, will very well recall some of those questions and debates, which went through the night. In the course of those discussions, we discovered some defect in the Standing Orders which were made in 1948 about the debates on Service Estimates. We found that hon. Members were very narrowly limited in the discussions which were permitted on the Votes of the Service Departments, amounting to many millions of pounds,


because of the introduction of a Guillotine procedure.
Some of us raised this question with Mr. Speaker and, on 11th March, 1954, Mr. Speaker gave the following Ruling, which is reported in column 2447 of the OFFICIAL REPORT:
I am bound to say that the introduction of the new Standing Order No. 16, in 1948, demands further consideration, because it would not be realistic to ignore the fact that it has been the custom of successive Governments since that day, when in Committee on the Estimates, to secure Vote A and leave the rest to the Guillotine. In this new situation, I have to consider the fundamental rights of the individual Member of the House. It appears to me that the way in which the Standing Order has worked has meant that hon. Members who have points of importance but, it may be, of detail to raise are frequently debarred by the operation of the Guillotine from reaching that Vote in the Committee stage, where, under the strict rules of the House, the discussion on those points would be most properly conducted. I give it as my Ruling and opinion that so long as that Standing Order is in operation the Chair should be relieved from its obligation to prevent discussion on matters of detail on the general Question, 'That Mr. Speaker do now leave the Chair.' I hope that is the common sense of the House in the matter, and that we shall follow that principle in our succeeding debates."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 11th March, 1954; Vol. 524, c. 2447.]
I should have thought that, as Mr. Speaker had said that Standing Order No. 16 demanded further consideration and had given a Ruling that the Chair should be relieved from an obligation imposed upon it by that Standing Order which was then considered to be a new procedural reform, the terms of this Motion would have been sufficiently wide to allow of discussion of that aspect of the Service debates. But it does not. This Motion is drawn so narrowly that it will exclude the possibility of the Select Committee considering this aspect of procedure which became a matter of violent controversy in the Service debates of 1953 and 1954 and which became the subject of a Ruling by Mr. Speaker about Standing Order No. 16 which he said was one that demanded further consideration.
I should have thought that was a matter that was far more important than the practice of moving Amendments in the Committee of Supply. Those who have really had experience of debates on the Service Estimates in the last few years, as you, Mr. Deputy-Speaker, know very well, have been mostly concerned with the problem that what is really required is a

procedural reform that allows a Second Reading debate on Service Estimates, a proper Committee stage and a Report stage.
The 1948 procedural reform introduced for the purposes of expedition a Guillotine procedure which virtually excluded a Committee stage. You, Mr. Deputy-Speaker, know that what has happened in the last few years in Service Estimates debates is that the Committee stage of the Service Votes has been forced back into the general debate on Army, Navy and Air Force policy. The way in which those debates have progressed is that an hon. Member might raise one question on Vote 16 and then somebody else talks about the hydrogen bomb and somebody else discusses pensions, and the debate goes hither and thither during the night without respect for whether one is discussing trivialities, individual cases or world-wide strategic policy.
That situation arises from the fact that in 1954 Mr. Speaker was compelled to give the Ruling that, because of the Guillotine procedure introduced in 1948, Committee points should be allowed to be raised in the general debate on the Services because, otherwise, they would be excluded altogether by the fall of the Guillotine after Vote A.
I agree with my hon. Friend the Member for Stoke-on-Trent, South (Mr. Ellis Smith) that, in view of the thousands of millions of pounds voted on Service Estimates, nothing is more important than proper consideration of procedure on those Estimates. In that case, the Ruling of Mr. Speaker on 11th March, 1954, should fall first for consideration. Mr. Speaker himself has said that Standing Order No. 16 demands further consideration, but the Government ask us to consider something entirely different and to pass a Motion which is so narrowly drawn that it will exclude from discussion any consideration of the real controversies about the attempt of hon. Members to scrutinise Service Votes with care in 1953 and 1954. I do not wish to go into the wider points raised tonight, but I should have thought that on that point alone the Government would seriously reconsider the Motion and be prepared to accept the Amendment so as to allow many of those things which have been omitted to be considered urgently as matters of priority by the Select Committee.

12.51 a.m.

Mr. Harold Lever: I had intended to make extensive comments on this subject had the debate taken place earlier in the evening, and had it not been so comprehensively covered by my hon. Friend the Member for Stoke-on-Trent, South (Mr. Ellis Smith), to whom we are all indebted, and by my hon. Friend the Member for Bristol, South-East (Mr. Benn), who illuminated the whole subject by the way in which, in a truly impartial manner, he brought the needs of the time to the attention of the Government.
I should like a little clarification from the Government on what the Home Secretary means when he says that he wants to hear the current opinion of the House, because it is perfectly clear that every back bencher who has spoken from either side of the House desires that there should be wider terms of reference to the Select Committee so that procedure may be looked at more broadly than it can be within the limits of the Motion. Notwithstanding the doubtful beneficence of agreement between the Front Benches as to what is not urgent in this matter, I hope that we are not to be treated again, as I rather suspect, to mere generalisation by the Government. I hope that the Home Secretary, in saying that he will give the discussion courteous consideration, does not mean that he will dismiss our views after a week instead of on the spot.
If the right hon. and gallant Gentleman means that, on behalf of the Government, he will accede to the obvious wishes of the House, there is not the slightest reason why he should not end the debate without the recrimination arising from a Division, by parting from his reticent breast the news that the Government intend, on this strictly House of Commons matter, to make a democratic response to the desires of hon. Members on both sides of the House as to what should be done. The right hon. and gallant Gentlemant could bring the debate and my speech to a swift conclusion if he did that, but if he means that he will give due consideration before rejecting the unanimous desire of the House, that is no satisfaction to us.
Even at this late hour there are things which I want to say that have not yet been said in the debate. First of all, I

hope that my hon. Friends who feel very bitterly about the difficulties in which they conduct their work as Members will not be led to believe that the remedy for late nights is early hours. Some of them seemed rather to express that view. I am not resentful that there are a number of hon. Members who desire to make the House of Commons their full-time occupation. But I hope that those who do devote more time to the House than some other hon. Members will not feel that their sense of virtue impels them to persecute hon. Members who do not give full time to the work of the House.
I am not saying that it is right for an hon. Member to be neglectful of his duties; some of the suggestions for proxy voting, tempting as they are, must be rejected in the interests of the House. Nevertheless, it would be a disaster for the House, and a departure from traditions, if the House were composed solely of professional politicians. It is my belief that a House composed of professional politicians only would be calculated to be more cynical and more complacent. I am not criticising hon. Members who have made the House their life's work.
I would urge on the Government that a general reform of procedure is required because, as is now commonly understood, if the House is to fulfil its functions it must do so with up-to-date methods. It is plain that if it attempts to fulfil the functions of scrutiny, defence of civil liberties, and the like, and act as far as it can as a great deliberative assembly, it must do so with different methods than those now employed. To attempt to perform these functions with the antiquated procedure which we have is bound to turn it into a treadmill, which will drive out from the House the part-time Member who has been such a feature in the past.
It is plain that there has to be a more rational allocation of time if the House is to get through its business in a normal way without giving way to these late-night sessions which we indulge in all too frequently. I do not want to deprive anyone of having the insomnolent revelry of an all-night session as often as he likes, but this dissipation without vice is not necessarily in the interests of the procedure of the House, and the position ought to be


remedied, not by bringing us here early in the morning, but by seeking to allocate the time of the House so that there is more time for serious subjects, like that of the re-conditioning of mental hospitals.
It is an outrage that those of us who are in the House at the time of the Budget have to watch the piffling annual charade, when ample time is provided for any trivial tarradiddle to be raised. Passion sweeps the Opposition benches about the living theatre, the dead theatre, the avant garde theatre, and there are volcanic eruptions of insincere emotion, day after day, in discussing Rugby league, football league, motor bicycles and the manufacturers of decorated chamber pots—all penalised by the latest Purchase Tax proposals.
There is ample time for all this, and it goes on day after day; but there seems to be no time to bring to the notice of the House subjects like that of the mental hospitals.
It is not surprising if the public, who do not live in the rarified atmosphere of the House, are beginning to lose interest, because they are not in the least amused to learn that the House of Commons sat up all night debating in a situation where Labour Members were proposing reductions in taxes which they resisted when in Government, and where Ministers were busy downing the arguments they advanced when in Opposition. That does not amuse the public, who are adult and intelligent enough to know hon. Members thus waste Parliamentary time which could be used for protecting the public's rights. All this calls for general consideration by the Select Committee, and it calls for proper consideration of what is wrong with the procedure of the House, if it is to be the great deliberative assembly of the people, the protector of their civil liberties and the guardian of the public purse.
It really will not do for the Home Secretary to say my hon. Friend is asking that we should act as unpaid chartered accountants. That is not our desire. We desire that the machinery by which the House conducts its business should be scrutinised as a whole by the Committee, and not only in the narrow way suggested in the Motion. It is only too plain from the Home Secretary's speech that he and the Government are anxious that due

consideration should not be given to the problems which beset hon. Members in effectively carrying out their duties and expressing their views.
This is not only a question of procedure but of easement of hon. Members' conditions of work and of enhancement of their position. It is not only a question of salaries. It is a question of the conditions in which we work, inside and outside this Chamber. There is the consideration of the use of the space within the Palace, the cavernous empty spaces upstairs, and the claustrophobic restrictions in which correspondence is attended to downstairs—

Mr. Speaker: These are not matters of procedure but of furniture.

Mr. Lever: I was trying to find sermons in stones, Mr. Speaker, and to draw an analogy between the use of space upstairs and down, where Members who like a little privacy in which to do their work cannot find it, and the antiquated procedure of the House. However, I do not wish to detain the House, and I am not engaging in any delaying action. I hope the Government will accept the sense of the House upon the matter, and not force us to divide upon that which arouses or should arouse the same sentiments on both sides of the House.

1.3 a.m.

Mr. Harold Davies: I regret the groans I hear. They are indicative of what is happening in this country today. I am reminded of what happened after Questions today, and the efforts of Mr. Speaker, who has a difficult job in controlling the House on occasions and in dealing with the rights of back benchers. After all, the front bencher of today may be the back bencher of tomorrow. I am concerned with the rights of the back benchers on both sides of the House, and to maintain the traditions of this Mother of Parliaments.
I notice that no Member newly elected is named amongst those Members who are to be appointed to the Select Committee.

Mr. Speaker: We have not yet got beyond line 10. We are discussing an Amendment to line 10. The hon. Member is going on to discuss the personnel of the Committee. We have not got so far yet.

Mr. Davies: I accept your Ruling, Mr. Speaker.
The danger of quaintness in these circumstances may destroy the democratic purpose of the House. There are vital debates to be held in this House. Whether we disagree or not does not matter. What matters is that we have the opportunity to air our grievances whatever they may be. There is, for instance, the question of Suez. The domination of the House by a quaint custom that a Privy Councillor has the right to speak before other hon. Members is entirely undemocratic.
I sincerely believe that in this House there is no difference on the Floor between the Prime Minister, in his august position, and the humblest and newest back bencher whom some thousands of constituents have elected. I ask the House to bear in mind that if an hon. Member is elected Privy Councillor he can speak on day X and still maintain his right to be called again on day Y, whereas a humble back bencher is unlikely to be called again in the near future after he has once spoken in a debate. Whatever groans there may be, this is a principle which we as back benchers must abhor.
I regret that the Leader of the House has thought it right merely to put down a narrow Motion on these issues of procedure. Some of us who try to keep alive the great tradition of the British people without hurling abusive epithets across the Floor or introducing personalities, believe that since the end of the war—and the tendency was there after the First World War—the views of the common people, expressed through their representatives in this House, have been growing less and less effective.
It was not for any truculent or jocular purpose, and I hope I am believed in this—[Laughter.] Some hon. Members may laugh, but some of us have taken the trouble wherever we have been in the world—and I have been in nearly every country—to say, in America, Russia and elsewhere, how proud we are to be Members of the British House of

Commons. I sincerely hope that hon. Members who may fundamentally disagree with the speeches I may make will believe that at least I make them in the traditional spirit of British democracy and nothing else.

I regret that it is at such a late hour that we deal with one of the fundamental processes of this Mother of Parliaments. I wish that the Leader of the House had broadened the matter. I will give an example from the Select Committee on Statutory Instruments, of which I am a member. I do not know the answer to the problem of the complexity of modern life; if any hon. Member knows it, he should reveal it. In the Select Committee I asked how many Statutory Instruments go through the House per week. The number averages 40–45. A back bench Member knows nothing about them unless he is a member of the Select Committee on Statutory Instruments. How can we, in this complex society, find a formula by means of which we can make sure that the Executive has not too much power and control over the House? That is a real problem confronting the House now.

I do not wish to make the House feel that it is being detained in a sense of filibustering. I believe that the few points which I have made about Parliamentary procedure are sincere and real in the mid-twentieth century.

Question put, That those words be there added:—

Mr. SPEAKER proceeded to collect the voices.

Several Hon. Members: Several Hon. Members rose—

Mr. Speaker: I have already collected the voices. I heard no one say "Aye" the first time.

Mr. H. Lever: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker—

Mr. Speaker: If there is any doubt, I will put the Question again.

Question put, That those words be there added:—

The House divided: Ayes 13, Noes 110.

Division No. 277.]
AYES
[1.13 a.m.


Allaun, Frank (Salford, E.)
Lever, Harold (Cheetham)
Yates, V. (Ladywood)


Brown, Thomas (Ince)
O'Brien, Sir Thomas



Craddock, George (Bradford, S)
Oram, A. E.
TELLERS FOR THE AYES:


Davies, Harold (Leek)
Simmons, C. J. (Brierley Hill)
Mr. Chetwynd and


Fernyhough, E.
Smith, Ellis (Stoke, S.)
Mr. Wedgwood Benn.


Howell, Denis (All Saints)
Williams, W. R. (Openshaw)





NOES


Agnew, Cmdr. P. G.
Gurden, Harold
Pitt, Miss E. M.


Anstruther-Gray, Major Sir William
Harrison, Col. J. H. (Eye)
Pott, H. P.


Arbuthnot, John
Heath, Rt. Hon. E. R. G.
Powell, J. Enoch


Ashton, H.
Hill, John (S. Norfolk)
Profumo, J. D.


Atkins, H. E.
Holland-Martin, C. J.
Raikes, Sir Victor


Baldwin, A. E.
Hornby, R. P.
Ramsden, J. E.


Balniel, Lord
Hornsby-Smith, Miss M. P.
Redmayne, M.


Barber, Anthony
Hughes Hallett, Vice-Admiral J.
Remnant, Hon. P.


Barlow, Sir John
Hughes-Young, M. H. C.
Renton, D. L. M.


Barter, John
Hylton-Foster, Sir H. B. H.
Roper, Sir Harold


Bldgood, J. C.
Jenkins, Robert (Dulwich)
Schofield, Lt.-Col. W.


Biggs-Davison, J. A.
Johnson, Dr. Donald (Carlisle)
Simon, J. E. S. (Middlesbrough, W.)


Body, R. F.
Johnson, Eric (Blackley)
Smithers, Peter (Winchester)


Bossom, Sir Alfred
Joseph, Sir Keith
Steward, Harold (Stockport, S.)


Boyle, Sir Edward
Keegan, D.
Stoddart-Scott, Col. M.


Brooke, Rt. Hon. Henry
Kershaw, J. A.
Stuart, Rt. Hon. James (Moray)


Brooman-White, R. C.
Kimball, M.
Studholme, Sir Henry


Bryan, P.
Kirk, P. M.
Summers, Sir Spencer


Chichester-Clark, R.
Leavey, J. A.
Thompson, Kenneth (Walton)


Cordeaux, Lt.-Col. J. K.
Legge-Bourke, Maj. E. A. H.
Thompson, Lt.-Cdr. R. (Croydon, S.)


Corfield, Capt. F. V.
Legh, Hon. Peter (Petersfield)
Thornton-Kemsley, C. N.


Crouch, R. F.
Linstead, Sir H. N.
Tiley, A. (Bradford, W.)


D'Avigdor-Goldsmid, Sir Henry
Lloyd-George, Maj. Rt. Hon. G.
Vane, W. M. F.


Deedes, W. F.
McKibbin, A. J.
Vickers, Miss J. H.


Drayson, G. B.
Maddan, Martin
Wakefield, Sir Wavell (St. M'lebone)


du Cann, E. D. L.
Mathew, R.
Wall, Major Patrick


Elliot, Rt. Hon. W. E.
Mawby, R. L.
Ward, Hon. George (Worcester)


Errington, Sir Eric
Maydon, Lt.-Comdr. S. L. C.
Ward, Dame Irene (Tynemouth)


Farey-Jones, F. W.
Medlicott, Sir Frank
Waterhouse, Capt. Rt. Hon. C.


Fisher, Nigel
Milligan, Rt. Hon. W. R.
Whitelaw, W. S. I.(Penrith &amp; Border)


Fraser, Sir Ian (M'cmbe & Lonsdale)
Nairn, D. L. S.
Williams, Paul (Sunderland, S.)


Galbraith, Hon. T. G. D.
Neave, Airey
Wilson, Geoffrey (Truro)


George, J. C. (Pollok)
Nicolson, N. (B'n'm'th, E. &amp; Chr'ch)
Wood, Hon. R.


Gibson Watt, D.
O'Neill, Hn. Phelim (Co. Antrim, N.)
Yates, William (The Wrekin)


Godber, J. B.
Ormsby-Gore, Hon. W. D.



Grant, W. (Woodside)
Orr-Ewing, Sir Ian (Weston-S-Mare)
TELLERS FOR THE NOES:


Green, A.
Page, R. G.
Mr. Gerald Wills and


Gresham Cooke, R.
Pannell, N. A. (Kirkdale)
Mr. Edward Wakefield.


Question put and agreed to.

Ordered,
That a Select Committee be appointed to consider the practice of moving amendments on going into Committee of Supply upon the Navy, Army, Air and Civil Estimates; the practice relating to Money Resolutions; the extension of the Standing Orders relating to public money to expenditure from Funds partly, but not wholly, financed from the Exchequer, being expenditure not directly involving a charge upon the Consolidated Fund or upon money provided by Parliament; the numbers required to form a Quorum of, and for the Closure in, a Standing Committee; and the constitution of the Scottish Standing Committee, and to report whether any changes are desirable in the Standing Orders, practice or procedure of the House in these matters or in matters connected therewith:

Mr. Ellis Smith: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. I do not intend to move my Amendment to leave out "Sixteen" and insert "Twenty-four". Had I done so, I intended to refer to great lessons in Parliamentary procedure that I was privileged to learn from my great friend Colonel Josiah Wedgwood and to read extracts from his book. In view of the lateness of the hour, however, the fact that we have already stated our case, and that it is now on record, I propose not to move the Amendment. I desire to

express our satisfaction at the way the matter has been dealt with by the House, and I trust that our ideas will receive growing support in time to come.
Committee to consist of Sixteen Members:—
Sir W. Anstruther-Gray, Mr. Baldock, Mr. Bellenger, Mr. de Freitas, Sir T. Dugdale, Mr. Elliot, Mr. E. Fletcher. Sir L. Joynson-Hicks, Mr. Glenvil Hall, Viscount Hinchingbrooke, Mr. Mitchison, Mr. Pickthorn, Sir H. Studholme, Mr. K. Thompson, Mr. Wade, and Mr. Woodburn:
Power to send for persons, papers and records; to sit notwithstanding any Adjournment of the House; and to report from time to time:—
Five to be the Quorum.

Orders of the Day — SUNDAY CINEMATOGRAPH ENTERTAINMENTS

Order made by the Secretary of State for the Home Department, extending Section I of the Sunday Entertainments Act, 1932, to the Rural District of Wortley [copy laid before the House, 25th July], approved.—[Mr. Deedes.]

Orders of the Day — WAR PENSIONS

Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn.—[Mr. E. Wakefield.]

1.22 a.m.

Sir Ian Fraser: It is unusual to have two Parliamentary Secretaries on the Front Bench for an Adjournment Motion, and I want to express my thanks to them. The presence of my hon. Friends the Joint Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Pensions and National Insurance and the Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Health illustrates the interest which these two Departments take in this subject. I should like to thank them and to say that any criticism that I make of matters of major policy does not in any way detract from my appreciation of the personal services which the Ministers themselves and previous Ministers have always given to Members of this House in connection with war pension matters.
It is the end of the term, so to speak, and I want even at this late hour to place on record some of the views of the British Legion and of ex-Service men generally with regard to war pensions so that they may receive proper consideration during the Recess. The main decisions which were arrived at by the British Legion at its conference last Whitsun were numerous, but I propose to refer to only three or four of them. The conference, representing the branches throughout England, Wales and Ireland, decided first of all to adhere to its longstanding policy of asking that the basic rate of war pension should be raised from the present figure of 67s. 6d. to 90s., etc.
That would be an all-round rough justice, and there is a great deal to be said for that proposal. It takes no account of means or employability, it does the same for all proportionately to the extent of their disability, and it is in line with a long tradition of war pensions policy. It encourages work and does not, as do some other methods of compensating people for disability, encourage idleness. Moreover, it has had the assent and support of successive Governments ever since the Second

World War ended, for all the Governments concerned have raised the basic rate.
Those are very powerful reasons why the Government should consider that particular proposal, and I hope they will. I would point out that in the last Parliament a rise of 22s. 6d. in the basic rate was made, and if this Parliament were to do the same the figure of 90s. which the British Legion has long asked for would be attained.
Also at the conference a plea was made that the special allowances should be increased. Unemployability allowance, the comforts allowance and the constant attendance allowance are very important additions to war pensions for a limited number of severely disabled men. The conference would like to see them improved to a considerable extent.
I now add an individual plea of my own, that men suffering from two or three disabilities—of whom there are very few, perhaps only a hundred or so in the country—should be specially cared for. There are known to me some men who have lost both their eyes and both their hands and others who have suffered similarly severe disabilities. They may be said to be 200 per cent. or 300 per cent. disabled and the system does not allow them to be properly compensated.
The conference expressed itself in no uncertain terms that the improvement in war pensions generally to which I have referred had been too long delayed. One of its resolutions urged the council of the British Legion to "redouble its efforts" to persuade the Government to do what was thought right. Another used the words that the National Council of the British Legion should "intensify "the pressure." "Pressure" of course means the pressure of persuasion, because the British Legion is a constitutional body which would not wish to use any other method than that of persuasion on Members of Parliament and other people.
It demanded a free vote on the issue of what the war pension should be. I ventured to point out to the delegates that no Government could grant a free vote on a matter which might cost £10 million or £20 million for any section of the community, however deserving, without the Chancellor being in the peril of seeing his Budget displaced, and that we could not


very well allow a free vote for one section and not for another. In spite of my advice, which I think hon. Members in all parts of the House would feel was sensible, the British Legion said, "We want a free vote." I mention that to show how strongly it feels that its case has not been properly listened to or dealt with by any Government since the end of the war. That is not surprising, because war pensioners are in a lower place on what I may call the cost-of-living ladder than they should be. Salaries, wages and incomes generally, including incomes from equity shares and professional fees, have risen by a large amount, but the war pension has not risen by a similar amount, at least for the overwhelming majority of war pensioners.
I turn quickly to another point. Most of the motor cars given to the most severely disabled men are seven years old and are beginning to wear out. It is time the Government announced some policy for their replacement. The allowance given to enable a disabled man to maintain his car and to some extent to pay for its running might have been adequate seven years ago but, despite a small increase to take account of the increased cost of petrol, it is no longer adequate. These cars are wearing out and the Government must make up their mind about replacing them. There are also demands that the one-seater tricycle which is a familiar sight in our streets should be replaced by a tricycle made for two.
Turning swiftly to another point—because I know how limited the time is—the Central Advisory Council which gives advice to the Minister of Pensions, or used to give advice to him, has met only four times in the last three years. I think that more use should be made of it and also that a suggestion which I made in the House at Question Time—that the Ministry of Health should be represented on it—should be considered by the Government. Such matters as these tricycles and hospital matters are now being dealt with by the Ministry of Health and, while I do not think that we want a separate Central Advisory Committee for that, it would be a good thing if representatives of ex-Service men's societies, when they go to the Central Advisory Council, should meet both Ministers or their representatives and talk to them

about every aspect of ex-Service men's affairs.
Is the figure of 90s. which is asked for too high? The calculations made by the Government show that a figure of 86s., or a little more, would be strictly justified immediately. The Legion does not accept the Government's calculations; its calculations show that something over 100s. is the right figure. I mention that merely to emphasise that the request for 90s. is not outrageous or unreasonable. It is, moreover, something less than the assessment which is put upon disabilities by courts of law when they are dealing with negligence, and although the circumstances are different, the disabilities are the same. I submit that it cannot be right for Governments to measure disabilities with one figure when independent courts of law measure them with a higher figure.
The reforms which the British Legion would like to see would cost £20–£22 million. The time will come—I hope next year or the year after—when large remissions of Income Tax may fall to be made. Should that be so, it seems to me that comparable amounts will have to be given by way of aid and comfort to those classes who do not pay Income Tax. I do not think the figure of £20–22 million is a large figure when that fact and the total national income are taken into account.
During last year the British Legion has adopted a policy of restraint in its pressure upon hon. Members and upon public opinion, and during the next few months that will perhaps be continued. It is very difficult in a democratic society to speak of restraint or of holding back, but nevertheless many wise men in the British Legion have withheld the pressure which they might otherwise have put upon hon. Members to listen to their plea and upon the Government. They have done so because they have felt that the attempt to stabilise the cost of living by calling for restraint all round was worth while. It was particularly valuable to those who live on small fixed incomes.
The time is coming when patience will be exhausted. We now ask ourselves when we may expect the reforms which we think are due to us. We ask that they be assured to us in this Parliament. I cannot tell, and I do not believe that the Chancellor himself knows, whether the


inflation will be checked by 1957 or by 1958, but I think it only right to say to the Government that this period of restraint and self-denial is drawing to an end.
The war pensioners are dying off each year at the rate of something between 16,000 and 20,000, and before they are all gone we want to see the proper recompense which we have measured and calculated given to them. We propose on 4th August—a significant date, though it is a pure accident that it should be so—to consider all the proposals which we unanimously passed at our annual conference and to draw up our British Legion plan. We then propose to call together all the specialist ex-Service societies which deal with special groups such as the limbless and St. Dunstan's and the deafened, and so on, and also of the membership societies in the land in the hope that they will all join with us in a united front.
It is our intention, starting as soon as we may be able, to mobilise our forces and to bring such proper and reasonable powers of persuasion to bear upon Members of Parliament and upon public opinion as will create the proper climate in which this claim will be met, if not in 1957 then at least in 1958. I think it only right that the Government should know this and should bear it in mind and study it. I hope that this plea which I make will be listened to not merely by the Ministers present, but will be studied by the Chancellor and the other leading Ministers so that when this Parliament comes to an end we may be able to say that it did as well as the last.

1.38 a.m.

Mr. Alan McKibbin: I was present at the annual conference of the British Legion to which my hon. Friend the Member for Morecambe and Lonsdale (Sir I. Fraser) has referred as the delegate for Ballymacarret. I wish to support my hon. Friend in his plea that the time has come when something should be done for the war disabled and the war widows. I have always considered, and have said so on many occasions both inside and outside this House, that war pensions should not be classed with other pensions, but should be dealt with separately and have first priority. I hope that my right hon. Friend the Minister of Pensions and hon. Members on both sides of the House will take the same view.

1.39 a.m.

The Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Pensions and National Insurance (Mr. Richard Wood): I am very glad that my hon. Friend the Member for Morecambe and Lonsdale (Sir I. Fraser) has raised these general questions affecting both the Ministry of Pensions and National Insurance and the Ministry of Health, because it is some time since we last debated them. I have the pleasure of the support of my hon. Friend the Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Health, and she has entitled me to speak on her behalf on the matters that affect her Department.
The first matter that my hon. Friend the Member for Morecambe and Lonsdale raised was that of the 90s. basic rate pension. This is a demand with which we at the Ministry of Pensions have rightly been kept familiar. I admit that my hon. Friend has made what I always think is an impressive case for the 90s. rate on the basis of the rise in the cost of living. It has been very fairly put by my hon. Friend, who is always zealous, eloquent and persuasive when he speaks as the champion of ex-Service men and their dependants. But I think that he will agree that the question of what the rate should be at present, in relation to what it has been before, naturally depends to a large extent upon the date which we choose as our starting point.
The year 1938 is generally chosen by the British Legion, and to compare the 40s. basic rate pension eighteen years ago with the 67s. 6d. basic pension now, admittedly, in my hon. Friend's words, suggests something like 90s. today. If, on the other hand, we take different dates—for instance 1919—we should be led to a figure rather nearer to the existing 67s. 6d.
I do not imagine that any hon. Member thinks that the basic rate of pension should be decreased if the cost of living falls, but generally, on all sides of the House we seem to take the view that it should bear some relation to an increase in the cost of living. I do not think, however, that it is particularly profitable to make a statistical comparison between the rate of pension obtaining before the war and the rate obtaining today, because the conditions of employment are fundamentally and radically different. Even more important, supplementary


allowances have been vastly improved since the last war ended.
The only one of the allowances which my hon. Friend mentioned that existed before the war was the constant attendance allowance, of which the top rate was then 20s. It is now £3. The un-employability supplement was started in 1943, the allowance for the lower standard of occupation and the clothing allowance were both started in 1946, and the comforts allowance was started in 1951 under the administration of the right hon. Member for Southwark (Mr. Isaacs). I honestly believe, therefore, that a comparison between 1938 and 1956 is a comparison of two entirely different schemes.
Whatever claims can be made for the ordinary pensioner who is in employment and earning good wages—and I admit that they may be strong claims—no one can possibly deny that since the last war successive Governments have completely transformed the situation for the most needy of all. And I do not think that we should forget that the increase of 12s. 6d. last year, part of the increase which my hon. Friend mentioned, was the biggest single increase that has been made in the history of war pensions. I feel that no Government can possibly be complacent about what my hon. Friend has said and in face of the British Legion's claim for 90s. That claim deserves and has received and will continue to receive the Government's constant consideration.
My hon. Friend the Member for Belfast, East (Mr. McKibbin) raised the question of the war widows. I am very conscious indeed of the difficulties which some widows are experiencing at the present time. The Government recently thought that the greatest need was felt by widows with children to look after, and they were able to give a 5s. increase per child, and a similar increase for war orphans. They were also able to give a higher ceiling in the rent allowance to widows with children. But the claims of widows have not only been expressed tonight; they are being continually and forcefully put by the British Legion and others. We shall continue to try and give help where the need for it is greatest.
My hon. Friend the Member for Morecambe and Lonsdale raised the

question of this matter being put to a free vote. I am sorry the British Legion rejected his advice, because this is really a matter for which the Minister and the Government must take full responsibility. It may be a field where they long to do more, but it is not one where they cannot make their minds up, nor where they have any desire to escape responsibility.
My hon. Friend mentioned supplementary allowances. All I would say is that the man with several disabilities—blind and without a limb or limbs—is already receiving quite a respectable sum of money: a basic rate of £3 7s. 6d., probably unemployability supplement of £2 5s., constant attendance allowance of £3; comforts allowance of 10s. and allowance for wife and children of £2 4s. making a total of over £11—in addition to any family allowances he may be receiving—these payments being free of tax.
Nevertheless, I undertake, and the Minister will undertake, to study very carefully the suggestions he has made, because we are both immensely sympathetic to the possibility of improving still further the position of the most needy pensioners of all.
I now come to the questions which are the responsibility of the Minister of Health. The first question was that of the two-seater motor-propelled tricycle. I cannot add a great deal to what my hon. and gallant Friend already knows. The Minister of Health recently saw representatives of the Invalid Tricycles Association, the R.A.F. Association and the British Legion, and pointed out the difficulties in providing these two-seater tricycles, the increased capital and maintenance costs and the time it would take to develop the two-seater tricycle. But he did, as I understand it, undertake to continue to consider the matter, and has not closed the door to this suggestion.
Last week he answered a Question, I think by my hon. and gallant Friend, about replacing the motor cars provided for severely disabled ex-Service men, and said he was examining this question, but was afraid he could not make a statement before the Summer Recess.
My hon. Friend mentioned the maintenance allowance paid to owners. I think he will agree it was never intended to be more than a reasonable contribution towards their maintenance. It will


not have escaped his notice that these machines tend to cost less in their first years than later. The adequacy or otherwise of this allowance depends on a certain amount having been put aside before the biggest bills arrive. It seems to me that they do not cost £57 a year at first, although they may cost a great deal more later on.
He also mentioned the question of the Central Advisory Committee of the Ministry of Pensions, and suggested they should hold more frequent meetings. The Minister of Pensions has expressed himself as anxious to leave the position as flexible as possible, and he does not feel justified in calling the members of the committee together, as they are busy men, merely to have a meeting. However, he said that he would certainly arrange a meeting if he wanted advice on any matter, or, if any member of the committee approached him, he would carefully consider calling the committee together.
The last suggestion was that a representative of the Ministry of Health should be included in the committee. My right hon. Friend has consulted the Minister of Health, and the result is that arrangements will be made on an experimental basis for the attendance of an observer from the Ministry of Health at future meetings of the Central Advisory Committee.
I repeat that I am immensely glad we have had this discussion. I hope sincerely that what I have been able to say, and, far more, the way in which both the Ministry of Health and the Ministry of Pensions and National Insurance try to administer the duties laid upon us, will leave my hon. Friend in no doubt as to our sympathy and desire to do all we can both for the war pensioners and their dependants.

Adjourned accordingly at nine minutes to Two o'clock.